


Not My Plan

by ashisfriendly



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bands, Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-21
Updated: 2016-03-21
Packaged: 2018-05-28 01:40:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 48,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6309223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ashisfriendly/pseuds/ashisfriendly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Birthday girl, Hana, has said these words to me: "Where is the fic where Leslie is in a punk rock band and Ben is just himself?" || College AU in the year 1995. College junior Ben Wyatt is having the normal college experience, until his girlfriend takes him on a journalist adventure that changes all that. Title from "Girlfixer" by The Distillers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [c00kie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/c00kie/gifts).



> Another old fic, brought over to the ol' AO3. Thanks to Caity and stillscape, happy birthday Hana!!!

Ben Wyatt was unsure of a lot of things, like how he would finish his English paper by Friday or how to get the weird smell out of the carpet in the corner of his dorm room. He was also unsure how he got so lucky. Or what air was like.

Wisps of soft brown hair fell over the sides of his face as he opened his mouth, his tongue tracing the plump line of her lips. He gripped her small waist, inching his hands under her sweatshirt. She arched her back in response and he smoothed his hands up, his palms flat on her warm flesh. He hummed as her hands pushed through his hair and behind his head. Ben smiled against her lips as his fingers passed her bra. She rolled her hips on his and he gripped the fabric and pulled.

“Ben Wyatt!” His roommate’s voice made Ben gasp and cough into his girlfriend’s mouth. She pushed off of him and pulled her sweatshirt down, bumping her head on the top bunk. “Shauna Malwae-Tweep!”

Ben tried to reach up to make sure Shauna was okay but she moved from him, dangling her feet over the side of the bed.

“I put a sock on the door, Chris.” Ben flung his hand toward the door.

Chris tilted his head in confusion. “What?”

Ben sighed and whispered an apology toward Shauna before matching her sitting position. 

“It means I’m kind of busy and want to be alone.” Ben, not so delicately, gestured between Shauna and himself.

“Oh. Well, solitude is great in times of meditation. I am only here to grab my Biology textbook.” Chris pointed at a stack of books and grabbed one from the middle. “Science is fascinating.” He gave them both a thumbs up and left.

Ben rubbed his face with a groan. He peeked at her through his fingers. Her dimpled cheeks were a shade of pink that were begging to be kissed. So he did, her lips curling into a small smile.

“I should go anyway.” Shauna stood up and pulled down on her oversized IU sweatshirt, as if it would help block Chris from seeing her topless five minutes ago.

“Okay.”

She gathered her things and leaned over to give him a kiss before walking to the door. Her hand gripped the doorknob as she turned back to him. 

“Hey, you want to go to this thing later? For the article I’m writing.” Ben noticed her lip gloss was smudged along her chin and it made his body buzz. 

“Of course.”

“Great. I’ll come by around 7. Bye.” 

He gave her a small wave and fell back on the mattress as the door shut. Ben let his eyes focus in and out on the beams above him. He contemplated whether he should lay there and be mad at Chris for a few hours or get some of his Econ homework done.

When his eyes opened again the sun was down and Shauna was shaking him awake. He smiled lazily and grabbed her waist, pulling her down. She giggled with a protest but he somehow kept her in his arms and on his lips long enough to make her watch alarm beep. She jumped and bumped her head on the top bunk again. He kissed her head before grabbing a plaid shirt and throwing it over his t-shirt. He pushed his feet into his shoes as they walked into the hall. 

He grabbed her hand as people ran past them. Another party was going on down the hall, in Tom and Jean Ralphio’s room. They threw a party every night, each one with its own disgusting or startling theme. By the way everyone was dressed tonight, Ben guessed it was maybe a gypsies and prisoner party, or just another theme he didn’t quite understand. He hadn’t been to one of their parties since that jungle party freshman year that featured live monkeys.

Ben clicked through the radio as Shauna drove. Their taste in music never collided, which was fine, but he could only listen to Hootie and the Blowfish so many times. Her off key singing was cute but it didn’t make up for terrible music. 

“What is this article about?” Ben asked, the car coming to a slow stop.

“Bands that have members who go to IU, remember?”

He vaguely remembered her saying something like that, but he thought they would be Dave Mathews type bands that everyone started forming last year. Teenagers got out of cars around them and others were already mingling in front of a building that looked like it was made out of large shipping containers and brick. Two guys ran at each other and hugged after slamming their bodies together, mohawks bending at their touch. Small groups of pierced patrons lined the building’s walls, smoking, yelling, or laughing. 

“Come on. Everyone is really nice.”

Nice. Everyone was nice according to Shauna, she trusted and talked to everyone. She also was observant, she probably noticed Ben gripping the seatbelt and his widened eyes. Maybe that was what made her a great future journalist. He tried to adjust his face to a more neutral position but some one threw a beer can and a group of guys cheered as it exploded, causing Ben to jump.

She put her hand on his forearm before getting out of the car and he followed. As they walked Shauna waved at different people with spiked jackets and patched vests. They said hi to her and some gave her hugs and Ben was starting to relax. She was right, they did seem friendly.

“Shauna!” A voice behind them made him jump and he spun quickly. He grabbed Shauna’s arm until he saw who the voice belonged to. He sighed and let go of Shauna’s arm as a girl walked up to them. She was short and her blonde hair was tied up in a messy pony tail. Her shirt, with the words BIKINI KILL across her chest looked like it had been cut and sewn to better fit her small body. Her eyes were a bright blue, even in the dim light of the street lamps, and her smile was warm.

“Leslie, hi.” Shauna said.

“I’m so glad you could make it. I have thought of a few headlines.” Leslie smiled even bigger, her eyes widening.

“Remember, this article is about all of the bands, not just yours.” 

“Yes, of course.” Leslie’s eyes shifted to Ben and then back at Shauna. “How about ‘Punk Schmunk: Local Band Sings About More than Tattoos and Piercings, comma, They Sing About Feminism’.”

“That’s a bit long for a headline--”

“Fine. ‘Riot Grrrl? More Like Rights _for_ Grrrls, parentheses, Through Music’. No that’s not good.” Leslie looked down and snapped her fingers, her face scrunching. As she thought, her nose crinkled and Ben found himself smiling. “Damn. I will let you know when I figure something out. I thought we could also have a different interview since the last one was off the record.”

“Everything was on the record.”

“I don’t think so.” Leslie pointed at Shauna and her eyes slid to Ben again. She looked at him for a minute and he felt his chest get hot. “I’m Leslie Knope, lead singer of First Wave, feminist activist, History major, and vice president of the Women in Politics Club.” Ben put his hand into her open palm and she squeezed it with a hard shake.

“Ben Wyatt... Econ and Accounting major.” She let go of his hand and nodded.

“Enjoy the show! As always Shauna, help yourself to a t-shirt, just let Ann know I said it was ok.” Leslie looked back at Ben. “You can have one, too, Numbers Robot.”

She passed them and Ben turned around and watched her. A white and black bandana poked out of her back pocket, bouncing with each step. Ben looked back at Shauna with a raised eyebrow.

“Leslie loves the press. She’s told me a few times.” Shauna explained.

He nodded, following her into the building. A young kid, who looked about 13, stamped Ben’s hand after Shauna handed him $4. Ben kept up with her, into the crowd where Shaun was greeted like an old friend. She didn’t look like she fit in there and Ben knew she didn’t listen to punk music but they seemed to welcome her anyway.

“I didn’t realize you went to so may of these concerts.”

“Shows.”

“What?”

“They call them shows,” Shauna said. She sounded like an anthropologist. 

She took her notebook out of her bag and a pen from behind her ear. Ben felt the familiar lightness in his stomach and he pulled her by the waist, kissing her neck. 

“Ben,” she whined.

“Sorry, sorry.” He put his hands up and backed away. 

“I’ll see you in a bit. I’m going to talk to Andy.” She kissed his cheek and and walked off.

Ben wasn’t sure who Andy was but Shauna quickly disappeared behind a group of girls in short skirts and torn tights. Ben turned and made his way to a corner of the room. There were couches lining the walls that looked like they were found on street corners and were probably full of diseases. He leaned against an armrest.

A guy wearing all black with pale skin was in the opposite corner. His beady eyes kept looking at Ben, making shivers crawl up his spine. Ben tried to focus on the ceiling or the crude graffiti on the wall but when he turned back to see if Beady Eyes was still looking at him, he was standing right in front of him.

“Ah,” Ben yelped.

“Do you know how you’re going to die,” Beady asked him. Or told him. Or something.

“Uh... wait. Who. What.”

“Well?” 

Ben took a deep breath. “No, I don’t know how I’m going to die. Wait, are you asking me or telling me?”

A blaring ringing of feedback made Ben jump and he looked toward the stage. A big guy  
with a guitar winced and gave the audience an apologetic wave. Ben looked back at Beady who somehow seemed closer this time.

“Well, it looks like the next band is almost ready so...” 

Ben quickly walked away with out looking back at Beady. He rubbed the back of his neck, trying to get rid of the chill running down his spine. He stopped at the edge of a raised platform that was the stage. Shauna was talking to a girl behind a table lined with t-shirts and cassette tapes. Maybe that was Ann. Shauna was writing in her notebook and nodding along with the girl’s words so Ben stayed along the stage, shuffling his feet on the cement floor. He should have asked Chris to come with him, maybe he should have brought his Game Boy, or some homework. No, no, that would make him look worse.

A couple thumps from a bass drum vibrated his chest. Ben caught the movement of feet on stage and he looked up, following the guitarist who apologized for the feedback earlier. His Chuck Taylors looked like they hadn’t been taken off in years, splattered with dirt and drawings in Sharpie. In big bold letters were the letters F. W. on the toe shell of one shoe. A girl with long purple hair stepped onto the stage. She grabbed a bass guitar that looked like it was splattered with blood and along the neck were the words ANN SUCKS. The bassist locked eyes with Ben and she growled at him. He looked away.

He tapped his foot anxiously, trying to remember what was in his Econ homework so he could try to form the answers in his head. The bass drum erupted in his chest again along with a few simple chords from the guitar. He still hadn’t heard the bass guitar.

“Excuse me.”

Ben whipped around and Leslie was behind him, grinning with her hand on his shoulder. Her eyes were heavily lined in black and her lips were a bright red, not the clean face he met only 20 minutes earlier.

“Enjoy the show.” She squeezed his shoulder and leaned her head to the side before she pushed passed him and hopped onto the stage. 

He watched her talk to the bassist who rolled her eyes before striking a few strings. Leslie stretched her arms and grabbed her guitar, slinging it over her shoulder. It was light green with wildflowers painted on it. She strummed a few chords, checked the microphone, and then nodded to the drummer (who looked just as out of place as Ben). 

Leslie shook her long bangs out of her face and grabbed the mic with one hand. Her nail polish was dark red.

“We’re First Wave!” Her voice filled his body and vibrated his feet.

The crowd erupted into cheers and Ben joined, clapping his hands as the drummer hit his sticks three times. They started a song that Ben couldn’t decipher into a coherent rhythm or actual lyrics. He decided to blame his misunderstanding on being distracted by the scrunch of the lead singer’s nose as she hit chords and bounced on her toes.

The bassist stayed bored as she played and the other guitarist hit every chord soulfully, like he was playing a different type of music that called for swaying and dramatic lip syncing. Leslie jumped around the stage, hair flying with each bounce. When she sang, or screamed, or yelled, her red lips almost grazed the microphone but she never touched it. After the song ended, the crowd erupted again. Leslie bent over to grab a bottle of water and Ben felt the need to look away.

“This next song” - Leslie took a breath - “is called ‘Susie B’.”

“Susie B” was just as hard to follow as the song before it. Ben tried to decipher the words Leslie yelled and carefully came to the conclusion that the song was about Susan B. Anthony.

_I vote with blood on my hands_  
And your name in my heart  
Thanks to you and Lizzie  
I’m free to be  
FREE! FREE! FREE!  
Free to be me 

That was how he spent the rest of First Wave’s set. He tried to figure out what lyrics meant and tried to find a meaning behind the songs that he could hardly dance or bounce or sway to. He had a hard time but it kept his mind off of the misery of being hit in the side a bunch of times when some one flew out of the mess of bumping bodies in the middle of the floor. He cheered with the crowd when they were done and watched them pack up their things as the next band started to set up.

“Hey,” Shauna said, wrapping an arm around Ben’s waist.

“Oh hey.”

She gave him a quick kiss. “Are you ready to go?”

“Aren’t there more bands?”

She waved her hand. “Oh this will go on until 2. I just needed some follow up with First Wave and this guy who travels with Lipsticker.”

Ben didn’t know what any of that meant but he nodded and grabbed her hand as she lead him through the room. Beady Eyes found him again and waved at Ben as he passed. The familiar chill went up his spine and he sped up. The goosebumps didn’t flatten on his skin until Shauna started the car.

That night, as Ben tried to fall asleep, he realized he never got his free t-shirt.

//

The static ring echoed in Ben’s ear as he waited. He traced a finger over a drawing on the table. It looked like a monster but also like a penis. Actually, the more he looked at it, the more it looked like a penis. He moved his hand into his pocket.

“Hello?”

“Hi mom.” He coughed.

“Benji! I hardly recognized your voice.” His mother’s soft tone still held its constant ease of passive aggression. 

“Yeah, sorry, I’ve been busy.”

He waited, letting the white noise do the talking for him. He hoped it conveyed that everything was the same, as always. Yes, he is going to class, yes classes are going well, yes he has lots of homework, yes he is still working at the Academic Support Center, yes he was still with Shauna, and yes no one knew he was Benji Wyatt: Impeached Teenage Mayor and Ice Clown of Partridge, Minnesota. 

“Your father said you haven’t called, he also has a new girlfriend.”

Ben was starting to think she only wanted him to call so she could complain about his father. He was the only one of her children who would listen to her complaining.

“Oh?”

“I’m just letting you know. And telling you to call him. Maybe you can meet her. I haven’t. I don’t want to, if that wasn’t clear.” He heard something beep in the background. 

“It was clear.”

“Good.” 

Another long pause filled the 700 miles between them. He scratched on a stain on his jeans and waited. She would fill the silence soon enough. He caught Chris in the corner of his eye, sitting down at a phone on the other end of the table. He waved before punching in a series of numbers.

“Do you want to talk to Steph?”

Ben imagined Stephanie’s face, pained and frantic, as she shook her head. She hated the phone almost as much as he did.

“No that’s okay, just tell her I say hi.”

“Sooner or later I’m going to forget I have a son and she will forget she has a brother.”

Ouch.

“Mom, come on.” He sighed and rubbed his forehead. “I’m sorry, I will try to call more often.”

“Sorry, hun. I love you, I’m just... cooking.” 

Ben rubbed harder. “I love you too. I’m going to go study with some friends.”

“Good, yes, okay. Tell Shauna I say hi.”

“I will. Bye.”

He heard his sister yell a goodbye and his mom softly said her own before the receiver clicked in his ear. Ben put the phone down and looked over at Chris who was ecstatically chatting with some one on the other line. He turned and waved at Ben and Ben returned it before walking out of the lounge and into the cool air.

Fall would soon begin to dwindle into winter, a time when he used to be excited for Christmas and now was a panic filled countdown to finals. He shrugged his shoulders and tightened his jacket around his torso, trying to forget about the homework he should be doing. Shauna told him to meet her for coffee around this time but he really needed to get some homework done.

But he also really needed to make out with her.

He crossed a long stretch of lawn and as soon as the he could see the student center, he saw Leslie.

He hadn’t really thought much about her since he watched her scream into a microphone and walk around in her bright red Doc Martens but there she was, in the middle of a group of students who seemed to be tied together. Some had signs in their bound hands but she looked like she was wearing hers in the form of a homemade t-shirt. As he walked, he must have been staring, trying to read the words spray painted on her shirt, because when he got close she locked eyes with him.

“Numbers Robot.”

Ben looked behind him. Oh, that was him.

“Ben,” he said.

She smiled. Ben stopped walking and turned to her. He let himself look at her shirt again and he swore she moved so he could see it better.

“Women’s Studies matters?” He didn’t mean for it to come out like a condescending question but it was too late and the way her eyes bugged out of her face and how her mouth turned up to one side in anger made him regret stopping. Or looking. Or existing.

“Leslie.” A girl grabbed Leslie’s arm and Leslie slid her hand into hers, their fingers interlocking. 

“I just, I thought... well, we have a Women’s Studies program and--”

“We have three classes and a minor that has to be supplemented with history and sociology classes.” Leslie said, her tone even but angry. Very angry.

“Oh, well I thought if there was a program, then there was--”

“You thought wrong.” This was a different girl. Ben recognized her from the show, she was the one that growled at him.   
Ben’s eyes drifted over the group, all watching his horrible attempt at relating to people who he had no business communicating with. He shoved his hands in his pocket and cleared his throat.

“Sorry,” he said. He looked at Leslie. Her cheeks were a warm pink. “I meant to ask you what you were rallying for but instead I read your shirt out loud like an asshole.”

Leslie blinked. He watched her face fall little by little, as if she was slowly coming to the conclusion that she could understand his curiosity. He heard every breath flow through his chest and out of his mouth as he waited for her to speak.

“Oh.” She let go of the girl’s hand and grabbed some one’s sign. It said I WANT TO LEARN HERSTORY. “This school claims it has a Women’s Studies program but what it has are three Women’s Studies courses and a minor. To achieve the minor, students have to take sociology or history classes or other random courses to supplement the lack of classes in the program. It’s half assed and hardly a program.” Leslie looked down at the poster and he missed the fire in her eyes. “Have you taken History 102?” She shook her bangs out of her face to look at him.

Ben took a few history classes but he didn’t remember them by course number.

“Is that Early US History?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I did.”

“How many women did you learn about or write a paper on?”

That was easy. “None.”

Leslie smiled and Ben found himself smiling back. He let her hold his gaze and have this victory. She deserved it.

“Well,” she said, “there you go.” 

People in the group started to talk to each other and yell at passing students about their cause. Ben just kept looking at Leslie who’s smile loosened while her stare held strong. She finally shrugged and shook her head, her bangs falling over her eyes. The girl who held her hand earlier nudged her. Leslie looked at her and they exchanged some kind of silent conversation. Ben thought he should leave, that this was over, but Leslie whipped her head back to him.

“Ben,” she said. “This is my beautiful roommate and band manager and all around amazing woman, Ann Perkins.” The girl extended her hand which was attached to Leslie’s. Ben shook Ann’s hand and felt Leslie’s knuckles on his.

“Hi,” they said in unison.

“This is April, an inspiring freshman who will run this school.”

“Or burn it to the ground.” April hissed.

“No.” Leslie nudged her with her shoulder. “She doesn’t mean that.”

“I do.”

“And this is Andy, he is in First Wave, too.” A big guy in the back that Ben recognized from the show nodded at him. “That’s Mark, he’s our drummer. And in the pink--”

“Ben!”

Ben turned and saw Shauna waving at him from the steps that lead into the library. She motioned for him to join her.

“Oh, well, I actually have to go.”

“You know Shauna?” Andy asked.

“Yeah she’s... um.” He put up a finger to Shauna and turned back to the group. “Um, she’s... my friend.” He grimaced. “I mean we’re dating.”

“Sweet.” Andy nodded.

“Yup. Well.” Ben took a step before saluting them. “Keep on keeping on dudes.” Ben shook his head as he walked, trying to get his weird voice and unusual words out of his mouth. He just called a bunch of people calling for female equality in curriculum ‘dudes’. He picked up his pace.

He caught up with Shauna, apologizing as they walked into the dining hall. Ben extended his arm and Shauna looped hers through it. “They are calling for a better Women’s Studies program. I thought you could major in it, I guess not. Actually, it’s only--”

“Oh I know.” Shauna leaned into his arm as she spoke. “Leslie knocked on my door this morning. ‘Third Wave Feminists Call for More than Three Classes’ was a headline suggestion. It was actually pretty good.”

Ben agreed.


	2. Chapter 2

Ben’s fist tightened around the paper, sharpened edges digging into his palm. He really worked hard on this paper. The night before. In an hour. Whatever, he may not have deserved a better grade, but he sure wanted one. He tossed it into the first trashcan he saw and kept walking, his fists clenched in the pockets of his hoodie. 

He didn’t even have an excuse for his negligence. Ultimate was on a short hiatus because of the cold weather and Shauna had been filling in as editor for the paper since the editor got mono. It was a huge deal and they celebrated by drinking cheap wine and having sex in her dorm room. But that was two weeks ago and she was busy practically every night and he stayed up reading comics and listening to Chris get up five times a night to go to the bathroom. 

Jerry greeted him as he walked into the Academic Support Center. Jerry obviously thought one day that he would go on and get his master’s degree and become a professor but three “beautiful daughters” later, he was still at the ASC, head of scheduling. Ben was sure that used to be an undergrad scholarship job.

Ben sat at a small table near the back of the room. He usually liked to help people with their homework from MATH 150 or the occasional blasphemous request to help a student from a trig class who probably paid their way into it. But not today. Today he felt like sulking about being a failure and a terrible college student, so he sat in the back.

He got out his own homework and wrote down some bullshit answers to some bullshit philosophy class assignment. Chris was a philosophy minor and convinced Ben that taking an intro class would be not only fulfilling, but fun. Ben found it not only stupid, but boring. A sudden voice broke his brooding.

“Jerry told me to see Ben Wyatt all the way in the back corner because he was the best math tutor.”

Damnit, Jerry.

Ben’s pencil stopped in the middle of some sentence he lost the meaning of many words ago. He looked up and met Leslie’s blue eyes, fresh and playful just like he imagined them when she randomly popped into his mind. Like when he thought about his classes for next year or when he saw a poster for a show. Or last night randomly while he read a panel from his Batman comic.

“Jerry also has a former runway model wife so I’m pretty sure he is not to be trusted.” 

She laughed and took a seat, three notebooks, two binders, and one book plopping onto the table with a hard smack. He watched her organize them, placing each item in a strategic pattern that she only understood. When his own stuff got in her way, she just laid her things over it. She smoothed her hand over a blank piece of notebook paper and grabbed three highlighters from her bag and pulled a pencil from the bandana that was tied around her pony tail. 

“I refuse to believe I am bad at math.” Leslie turned to him, her eyes narrowed.

“Okay.” Ben craned his neck to look at her textbook. “You’re taking advanced calculus?”

“Yes, because, as I said, I’m not bad at math.”

Ben nodded and rolled his shoulders. “Okay, what’s the problem?”

“I failed my test.” Leslie flipped through a binder and pulled out some paper. A big red F was askew next to her name. 

“I see.”

“You really are a robot.”

“Aren’t you a history major? Why didn’t you just stop at 150?” 

She laughed at that. A big hearty laugh that echoed in the room, gaining looks from other students. Ben raised an eyebrow and watched her. She was clean of makeup and he could see the lines on her cheeks from her smile. A piece of yellow hair kept moving over her face as she leaned her head back or when she fell forward.

“Because” - she turned her body toward him and inched close to his face, eyes serious and mouth tight - “I’m going to be President of the United States and numbers are important.” He felt heat rise up his neck and his pulse pushed against his skin. He swallowed and nodded, their foreheads almost touching.

“I, um...” He cleared his throat. “That’s kind of why I... majored in economics and accounting.” Leslie blinked and leaned back in her chair. He felt his lungs squeeze for air and he took a big breath as she crossed her legs. “I don’t know if I want to be president but--”

“Running against me would hinder all chances but yes, go on.”

He softly grinned before swallowing. “But I do want to run for office someday. And, I have to prove I’m responsible.”

“Don’t you mean run for office again?” She wore a self satisfied smile.

“Excuse me?” He felt his stomach start to gurgle and his gag reflex began to swell. He wanted to back out of this conversation. Wait, he started this conversation.

“Since you brought it up” - she put her hands on the edge of the table and leaned closer to him - “Benji Wyatt, Teenage Mayor of Partridge, Minnesota,” she whispered.

Ben couldn’t move and he thought he was hearing loud circus music in his head. Leslie’s face went in and out of focus. He tried to calm his breathing but he also felt like he hadn’t taken a breath in years. The music got louder and his skin suddenly felt very tight.

“Ben? Ben. Ben!” Leslie’s voice was distant and soft even though she looked so close. So close he could smell the vanilla from her hair. She touched his shoulder and he felt his body move. He blinked. 

“How--”

“Hey,” she whispered. Her pony tail swished as she looked around the room and back at him. “I didn’t mean to make you upset.” She squeezed his hand and it felt weird there. Not bad, but weird. She tried to pull away but he held on.

“How did you know?”

“The issue of People you were in had Janet Reno on the cover.”

“Good Lord.”

“I just... I thought it was really cool.”

Ben cleared his throat. He sighed and let his head fall forward. He saw their hands intertwined and quickly let go.    
“Well you shouldn’t, it was a disaster,” he reasoned. It ruined his life for a year and now he was moving on and this girl was pushing it back in his face again. He wanted to drop out of college and move to Australia. Or Africa. New Zealand. Whatever.

“A bunch of my friends and I made t-shirts.” Leslie’s cheeks were a slight shade of pink when he looked back at her. “You were a big deal. A kid, taking his government by the horns and pushing for what he believed in, something for the people.” She covered her face and her giggle echoed through her fingers. “I can’t believe I told you we made t-shirts.” She peeked at him and he silently wanted to see the blush that she was hiding again. “But we did. It was pretty bad ass.” 

Ben cleared his throat and looked down at his hands folded in his lap. Leslie eventually unmasked her face, back to its neutral shade. She was the first person to paint his run in office positively and it felt nice and not like the hellish nightmare thinking about it usually brought out in him. At some point one of them cut the silence by asking an actual math related question and at another point Jerry had to tell them to stop laughing so others could study.

When Leslie’s math homework was done with, Ben would guess, about 40% of her understanding it, they left. He offered to walk her to her dorm but Leslie shook her head, looking past him.

“Turn around,” she suggested.

He did and walking toward them was Shauna. Her hair was a mess on top of her head and she was holding a stack of folders. Her eyes met his and she came to life, smiling in a way that could only be described as thankful. He leaned over to kiss her and she handed him the stack. 

“Please carry these, I will buy you coffee,” she said, her voice worn.

He nodded and took the stack, turning to say goodbye to Leslie.

But she was gone.

//

The next week, Leslie showed up at the same time and they sat at the same table. She waltzed in with another terrible grade from a pop quiz and slumped in her chair while Ben looked it over. It was the first time she looked so small and defeated in front of him. He tried to keep his eyes on her obliterated pop quiz and not on her cold bitten cheeks or the overwhelming feeling that he wanted to hug her. So instead he cleared his throat and started to redo the first problem and eventually she sat up straight and watched and learned and the fierce determination reappeared across her face.

The next Thursday was the same. Leslie sat at the table, no test or quiz in hand but a dozen problems that were due the next day. In the middle of an equation Ben pointed to her shirt and asked Leslie what FUGAZI meant and three questions later he said, "You know, I know who The Clash is." She giggled into her palm, her highlighter sticking out from between her fingers, the tip grazing her nose, leaving a pink mark. Leslie drew faces on her fingers and used them to explain Plato's metaphor of The Cave so Ben could understand it, even if he didn’t buy it. When Ben said goodbye to her, he noticed the smudge of pink still on her nose but didn't say anything.

And that became their routine. Every Thursday Ben sat down at the small table in the back of the ASC and waited. He read a comic book or worked on some homework and around 3:04PM, Leslie slammed her books on the table and that was when real work got done. He did his bullshit philosophy homework or did the English reading for the week and Leslie furiously wrote down numbers and symbols just to erase her wrong answers and demand he show her how to find the correct answers. She was getting better, each week giving him more and more chunks of solid reading time before she nudged him with her shoulder for help. 

This week was her midterm and Ben thought she was prepared, she was actually ready. Her test was on Wednesday and he waited for her at their usual time, on their usual Thursday.

Ben read one panel in his Batman comic over and over, listening for doors opening and Jerry’s usual greetings or a flash of blonde hair. At 3:10 he was worried she wasn’t coming. She wasn’t even in the weekly schedule, he wasn’t her weekly tutor, their meetings weren’t a permanent staple in their lives, she didn't owe him this time slot. When 3:30 rolled around he closed his comic book and reached in his bag for his philosophy book. She was busy, she had friends to celebrate a good grade with if she got it, and those same friends to console her if she failed. She didn’t owe him a grade.

He flipped through his book, reading the last sentence of each paragraph and rereading some of them to kill time. He hardly registered any of it but he was doing what he was supposed to and not thinking about Leslie - Leslie’s grade.

“Hi Leslie, how--”

“Stand down Jerry.”

Ben turned his head and he saw her, biting her lips to keep from showing her emotion, her footsteps strong. Here eyes were hard on him, a look that he couldn't decipher and place into a letter grade. When she stopped in front of him, he realized he was standing, he didn’t remember standing. Leslie tilted her head up and he heard the paper behind her back, it’s crinkle in her hands, and her eyes flashed mischievously and he wanted to shake her. 

“Leslie.” 

Her bottom lip pushed out from her teeth and it was a deep red from where she was biting it. He raised an eyebrow and when she still didn’t show him, he went to grab it. She swatted his hand away and pulled out the test.

Her name in her impressively neat scrawl was blurry as he adjusted his eyes. Next to it, in clear focus, was a huge B and the note “Great improvement!” underneath it. Leslie lowered the paper and all he saw were her eyes and the tip of her nose. She squealed and Ben pushed the paper down and scooped his arms under hers and gripped her. Leslie wrapped her arms around his neck, the test falling to the floor. He took in a breath and the vanilla from her hair mixed with the smell of Sharpie on her wrist (where she wrote anything down that she might forget). She gripped him hard so he tightened his hold on her and she felt so small but her embrace was so full of energy and it made her huge.

“Thank you.” Her breath grazed the tip of his ear and he felt a chill go through him. Then his body stiffened.

She must have felt his muscles clench because she quickly let go of him and he followed, rubbing his palms on his jeans. Leslie pushed her bangs away from her face, sliding the locks behind her ear. Her eyes fell to her test on the floor and she picked it up while Ben cleared his throat and sat down.

“You-you’re welcome.”

“I actually can’t stay. I just wanted to tell you,” Leslie said. He watched her black Chuck Taylors scuff the floor.

“Oh.” He flipped a page in his philosophy book.

“Yeah.” Her toe shell had ANN written on it with a red heart around it. “Actually, if you’re not busy, you can come.”

He wasn’t busy. He got a reasonable amount of his philosophy reading done and since Shauna had been busy with the paper he’s had more time to finish his homework and, well, he only had one class tomorrow. 

“Come where?”

“Mark’s other band is performing. Saints of Nothing. They’re more poppy than First Wave. Kind of like Jawbreaker or Texas is the Reason.” Ben looked up and raised an eyebrow. “Um, or Weezer?”

“Oh yeah.”

“Yeah, anyway.” She swallowed. “Do you want to come? You should come.”

"Uh." The chill in his spine still buzzed and it made his palms sweaty. "I don't think I can."

Leslie nodded and looked down, her shoulders slumping. Her eyes flicked up to him through her bangs. She looked disappointed and she swung her leg over her other, crossing them at her ankles. She rocked onto her heels and then straightened her legs.

"Oh, okay."

He wasn't sure if it was how hurt and surprised she sounded or because he actually was missing a chance to be with friends instead of sitting in his dorm room while Chris did sit-ups that made him say, "You know what, sure, I'll go."

"Great." She beamed.

In the quad, they met up with Ann who, Ben learned, was the one with the car. They piled into her VW Bug and he sat in the back while the girls chatted about their days. He kept meeting Ann's eyes in the rearview mirror so he eventually kept his gaze out of the small window. He wondered if Shauna would come looking for him and if he should have left a word with Chris or went by the journalism lab to tell her he was going out with friends.

"Are you hungry?" Leslie's face poked out from the side of the passenger seat.

"Sure." 

She smiled. "Sorry we're ignoring you, I haven't seen Ann since this morning."

He shrugged and shook his head, leaning back in his seat as they drove on. Leslie gave Ann directions ("She's terrible with directions." "No I'm not!") and Ben just smiled at them, bickering lovingly as they navigated their way through Bloomington. After Ann parked, Ben awkwardly climbed out of the car after Leslie and shoved his hands in his pockets to block the cold. He didn't prepare for a departure from campus and he was paying for it.

He lingered behind the girls who joined at the front of the car and linked hands, their fingers lacing. His pulse quickened and his curiosity spiked. He watched their hands sway as they walked, alternating black and purple nail polish on their fingers. Leslie leaned into Ann as they stepped onto the curb and she grabbed the door for the both of them, Ann keeping it open for Ben to grab. He saw Leslie's hand tighten around Ann's and slide up her wrist before she let go, sitting down in a booth. Ben sat across from both of them.

Leslie ordered a hot chocolate and a coffee with no cream for Ann. Ben ordered a water for himself and he kept his eyes on the menu. He tried to not think anything of their shifting bodies or hands out of sight. He smoothed his hand down the menu like he was contemplating all the choices but he knew he would be getting the turkey club. Leslie leaned across the table and put her finger next to the waffles.

“You should try the waffles.” 

He flicked his eyes up and met her stare. She was grinning with her usual self satisfaction and confident attitude that followed her everywhere except in math. Ben shifted his look to Ann who was watching Leslie. She must have felt his eyes on her because she looked at him and Ben cleared his throat.

“I think I’m going to get the turkey club.” 

The waitress came to the table and Leslie sat back in her seat and they ordered their food after she placed their drinks in front of them. Ben traced patterns in the condensation of his glass while Ann told Leslie (and him, maybe) about her terrible organic chemistry class. He kept watching their fingers out of the corner of his eye. 

“My aunt is a lesbian.” He winced and gave his head a quick shake. “No she’s not.”

“What?”

Ben kept his eyes down. “Sorry.” He took a breath. “I meant, are you... are you guys - ladies - together?” 

Leslie smiled and grabbed Ann’s hand and Ben lifted his head.

“Tragically, no, Ann and I are both heterosexual,” Leslie said and Ann nodded sheepishly. “We tried, but no.”

Ben felt his throat tighten. “Oh.”

Ann blushed and grabbed her coffee, blowing on it with her eyes down. He stopped himself from filling the silence with underhand perverted questions or his own sporadic gay thoughts. But the silence felt awful. He could hear the squeak of chairs and the sound of his jacket on the booth lining. 

Leslie finally broke the silence by asking Ben how his water was and they somehow drifted into a conversation about how terrible the dining hall food was until their own (better) food arrived. 

His sandwich was fine and Leslie made him try a bite of her waffle and he had to admit it was pretty good, definitely better than his sandwich. He told her it would be better with syrup on it and she gripped the table and told him to take it back. He didn’t, but Ann quickly changed the subject to something about Al Gore’s tie color of choice and Ben could breathe again.

In the car, Leslie pulled down the passenger side visor and opened the attached mirror. Ben watched her apply red lipstick and eye liner. She caught his gaze in the mirror and smiled and he returned it.

But something was different when they arrived at the small record store where Mark’s band would be performing. Leslie didn’t grab for Ann’s hand or arm and she raked her fingers through her hair before stepping inside. The girls led him to an aisle with a clear view of the newly opened space that would be the stage. He saw Mark setting up drums and a few other guys helping set up sound equipment. More patrons filed into the store as they silently waited. Ben looked through a few rows of tapes until he heard Leslie’s voice.

“Hi Mark.” 

At least he thought it was Leslie’s voice. It was softer and held a smoother tone, maybe it was even a bit higher. He turned his body so he could see her but kept running his finger down lines of cassette tapes as if he was looking at them.

“Oh hey, Leslie.” Mark waved at her and looked to Ann. “Hi Ann, how are you, thanks for coming.”

Leslie watched Mark talk to Ann and then his focus shifted between the two girls as they discussed stuff Ben didn’t understand about booking venues and failed equipment. Leslie’s eyes were softer when she looked at Mark, following his moves as if they were poetic. Something about it made him uneasy. He had been with Leslie when she wasn’t her best, when a bad grade made her feel like “a rotten raccoon” but this felt different. She still seemed weak but also infatuated and it didn’t sit well in his stomach. He swallowed and took his eyes off of her as he passed an Aerosmith tape. She just wasn’t being herself, he kept repeating in his mind.

“Ben, right?” Mark took a step past Ann. “You were at the women’s rally.”

Ben turned and stuck his hand out and Mark took it. “The Women’s Studies Program rally, yes.” His eyes shifted to Leslie but she was looking at Mark.

“Right, yeah. Sorry. There’s a lot of them. Leslie’s very active.” He said it to Ben like a secret they shared but Ben didn’t share anything with Mark. Except a slight sense of style, maybe. “Thanks for coming.”

“No problem. Leslie invited me.”

Mark nodded and pushed his hands in his pockets. “Good. Thanks, Leslie.”

Leslie giggled as she spoke. “Yeah, yeah.”

Ben arched an eyebrow and looked at Ann who shook her head and looked away.

Mark gave them a toothless grin and turned back to setting up. A guy shoved him with his elbow and Mark told him to shut up. Ben felt like an outsider in a puzzle that he needed to solve. He watched Leslie as she watched Mark and Ann kept shifting her gaze to Ben. Every time Ann lingered her stare on him, he had hope she would tell him what was going on, why Leslie hadn’t even talked to Ann since they got into the building, why she was talking like she was 15, why she kept putting her hand through her hair. He was starting to wonder why he was even invited. 

Saints of Nothing did sound like Weezer and Ben found himself nodding along with the crowd. This audience was tamer than his last experience, just nodding and bouncing to the beat. The lead singer didn’t move as much as Leslie did and there was no weird soulful lip syncing guitarist or angry bassist. It was definitely more Ben’s speed but he could go without Leslie avoiding him or the way she cheered after each song and elbowed Ann anytime Mark twirled drumsticks between his fingers.

When they were done, the band started packing up their things and Leslie was whispering to Ann, her smile huge and eyes awestruck. Ann just nodded, trying to keep up with Leslie’s words that looked like they were going a mile a minute. Ben pushed off the shelf he was leaning against and went up to Leslie.

“Hey, it’s stuffy in here, do you want to get some fresh air?” He could feel Ann’s eyes on his back.

Leslie blinked and then turned to him. “Oh, no that’s okay, I’m fine. I’m going to talk to Mark.” 

So he didn’t get air. And he watched another band’s set through the corner of his eye as he watched Leslie wait by the makeshift merchandise table to talk to Mark. Two girls in tight jeans and t-shirts for a camp or elementary school he was sure neither of them went to kept Mark’s attention while Leslie waited. Ben didn’t get it. This guy was in her band, didn’t she see him enough? Why did she need to wait for him? Why did she invite Ben here?

“They slept together during freshmen orientation.” Ann leaned over and kept her eyes toward the next band that was setting up as she spoke.

“Why does she like him?” The words came out before he could phrase them better or control the tone of his voice.

Ann eyed Ben. “I don’t know.” She shrugged. “He’s kind of the opposite of what Leslie likes.” 

“What does - never mind.” Ben suddenly wanted to leave.

Ann glared at him and then turned away. “I’m ready to go.”

“Me too.”

They rounded up Leslie, who waited 30 minutes to only say goodbye to Mark. In the car, she checked her reflection again while asking Ben what he thought of Mark’s band. He gave some canned answer and closed his eyes as the car zoomed back to campus. He kept drumming his fingers on his thighs and tried to think of where Shauna would be at 9:30. When he climbed out of the car, he thanked Ann for driving and Leslie for inviting him.

“Wait, where are you going? I can walk you to the dorms,” Leslie offered.

“No thanks.” Ben turned around and slung his backpack over his shoulder. “I’m going to the journalism lab.”

It was like his response to her offer in the ASC all over again. But he didn’t care. He just spent over three hours with her, watching her giggle with Ann, swoon over Mark, and being ignored. Her disappointing face and downcast eyes had no effect on him now, and they probably really shouldn’t have earlier.

“Bye,” he said and walked off.

The cold was piercing through his jacket and bit his face. He was upset that he cared about Leslie’s math grade, he was mad that he felt hopeful about their night out, he was angry about how it went, but more than anything, he was fucking furious that he was mad at all. He shouldn’t care, he shouldn’t be stomping his feet in frosted grass or throwing the door to the journalism building open with such force that he felt his shoulder pop. 

Shauna never made him feel this way. She never made him angry, she was calm and composed and he felt the same when he was with her. He never doubted seeing her, he never was disappointed after they hung out or kissed or had sex. He should be with Shauna, watching her type up articles and organizing the front page. And kissing her. He should be kissing her right now.

Shauna was alone in the lab when he opened the door, holding paper while it printed. She turned and smiled, tired but happy to see him. He grabbed her waist and pulled her into him. She protested against his mouth, something about ink and smudging pictures but he lined his tongue along her bottom lip and he felt her relax in his arms. He backed her up against a table and gently laid her down, his backpack dropping to the floor. He kissed her dimpled cheeks and brushed her hair off her neck so his lips could find solace there.

“Hold on,” she whispered. Ben kissed across her collar bone and pulled on the collar of her shirt to gain more access. “Let me just hit cancel.”

Ben put out a hand as a request for her to stay put. He walked over to the printer and hit the big red button and everything went quiet. He walked back up to her and pushed her shirt up, trailing kisses up her stomach. 

“I missed you,” she hissed. She put up her arms and Ben took her shirt off. He licked up her breastbone and along her jaw. His hand snuck under the waistband of her jeans as he found her lips again.

“Me too.”


	3. Chapter 3

Each semester, right after midterms, the ASC was flooded with people looking to improve their grade for a class that they were now failing. It was always surprising to Ben that no one looked for help until they were halfway through the semester when they had been failing all along. 

Ben sat at his usual back table while a frantic freshman babbled on about how hard he worked but he still was failing geometry. Freshman like Chad didn’t understand that the effort had to be taken for himself, that his parents wouldn’t keep his schedule and make him do his homework and professor’s didn’t coddle their students like high school teachers did. But Ben never told them that, he just showed them how to find X or explain mathematical theories in as many different ways he could until they understood. 

“Do you have some of your homework?” Ben asked, rubbing his temple. Chad was number three so far on his schedule that was usually left open for Leslie. It was almost 4 o’clock and she still hadn’t come by so he shouldn’t care that these worried kids kept filing in. 

Not to mention stupid Jerry kept using him for math referrals.

“I don’t know where it is.” Chad pushed his hands through his curly hair and dug in his backpack, pushing past crumpled up papers and garbage.

“Fine, just give me your midterm.”

“Can’t find it, but I failed.” 

Ben hit his hands on the table.

“Listen, Chad,” Ben knew he was being loud but he was tired of these conversations and he was tired from aimlessly walking around campus and he was tired from staying up late trying to understand the bullshit in his philosophy book and he was so fucking tired of being everyone’s fix it machine. “You can’t expect to just cruise through college like you did high school. It doesn’t work that way. No one here gives a shit whether you pass or fail, only you can give a shit about that. So stop floating through this and actually WOMAN UP” - he coughed, startled by his random use of a Leslie term - “and do this for yourself and get what you want, not what comes easy.”

Chad looked at him, eyes wide and still one hand deep in his backpack. 

“Ben, maybe--”

“No, Jerry.” Ben grabbed his notebooks and his stupid philosophy book and stood up. “I’m leaving for the day. Good luck, Chad.”

Ben threw his backpack over his shoulder and walked out. He wanted to do anything but follow the default route straight to the coffee line in the dining hall but he was too mad to focus on going anywhere new. He paid for his coffee and tore open sugar packet after sugar packet because it just felt good.

“Woah there.”

Ben looked up, tightening his fist around an opened sugar packet. Sugar fell into his palm and through his fingers. Ann’s eyes went from his hand to his face and back again.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“I’m fine, this sugar is helping.”

Ann rolled her eyes. “Okay.”

Ann stirred her own artificial sweetener in her coffee and Ben poured milk in his. They stirred in silence, Ben’s eyes wandering around the room. If Ann was here, Leslie had to be close behind. 

“Well, see you later.” Ann pushed the cap on her cup and walked past him. Ben reached out and grabbed her arm.

“Wait.” Ann stopped and looked down. “Leslie didn’t--”

“She’s busy,” Ann said. Ben kept his hold on her even though she answered him. Ann, or Leslie, didn’t owe him anything, but he held on to her like she had the answers to everything. “I’m really running late to chem.”

Ben, startled, let go. Ann looked at him again, like he was an organism she was studying under a telescope. She looked up at the ceiling like she was contemplating something, considering something that she didn’t want to. She sighed before she spoke.

“She’s really stressed about the end of the semester ball. Her club is throwing it this year.” And as if she thought that was enough, she walked away.

Ben followed her. “End of the semester ball?”

“The dance that’s at the end of every fall semester? A new club throws it each semester and this time it is the Women in Politics club.”

Ben must spend more time locked up in his dorm room and the ASC than he thought. “What?”

“Leslie was right, you are a robot.” She pushed open the door to the science building and he followed. She looked back at him with big eyes.

“She said I’m a robot?” His voice sounded lighter and he coughed to clear it into its normal tone.

“Just leave her alone unless you know how to balance the ‘patriarchal bullshit budget crisis of the century’,” she said, opening a door to a lab classroom. 

“What’s her budget?” 

Ann chuckled, shaking her head. “Please leave me out of this.” And she closed the door behind her.

Ben tightened his grip on the strap of his backpack and turned toward the dorms. He could see the cool fog of his breath as he sped up, slipping on frosted ground. He unlocked the door and walked down the hall.

“Jello Shot!” Jean Ralphio hopped on Ben’s back.

“Not now.”

“Fair enough.” Jean Ralphio bounced off Ben’s back and disappeared into his own room.

Ben pushed open his door and found Chris looking at flash cards that were spread out underneath him as he did pushups. The click of the door made Chris look up. 

“Ben Wyatt!” He did three more push ups and then sat back on his knees. “How are you?”

“How do the clubs get funding?” Ben felt suddenly out of breath. Did he jog here? He dropped his bag to the ground.

“Well there are a lot of ways that the clubs get funding and--”

“I need to know the end of the semester ball budget.” 

Rooming with Chris has proved beneficial for the last two and half years. Chris was a really good friend, and listened to Ben when he had problems and never said “I told you so” when Ben brought back a terrible grade on something he finished 15 minutes before class. He made Ben smoothies sometimes and introduced him to a girl freshman year that let Ben get to second base. But, right now, he was just thankful to have an undergrad scholarship worker from the Student Life office as his roommate. 

//

Ben had no idea where she lived.

He didn’t know her class schedule.

All he knew was she had an advanced calculous class on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and (usually) spent her Thursday afternoons in the ASC. 

So finding her was hard.

He was stupid to be so mad at her after Mark’s show. Leslie was his friend. She laughed with him and kept him company in the ASC and she helped him with his philosophy homework while he helped her with her math problems. She made him a mix CD that had nothing he really liked on it but the thought was what mattered. Leslie was thoughtful, she was a fixer, she believed in being a good person, in helping the public. He owed her his friendship and he owed her his help. Balancing budgets would most likely be in his future and he found it kind of fun. Maybe he was even good at it.

He took a breath as he pushed open the door and the cold hit him. He tightened his jacket around him and pulled down his beanie over his ears. And he missed her. He wanted to argue about how stupid philosophy was and laugh at her when she had tantrums over limits. 

Leslie was his friend and he missed her.

It was also 9 o’clock on a Saturday so none of his leads were helpful. She could be performing or watching Mark perform again. His feet quickened to the first women’s only dorm building. She had to sign up to be in a women’s dorm, right? He, of course, couldn’t get into the building so he banged on the door, looking through the small window as it shook. A group of girls were talking in the lobby and looked at him. His breath fogged the window.

He watched them look at each other before one came to the door, opening it a crack.

“Does Leslie Knope live in this building?”

The girl shrugged and turned to her friends. “Does Leslie Knope live here?”

“Leslie Knope?”

Ben rolled his eyes. “Yes, Leslie Knope. Short, blonde hair, history major, bad at math, president of the Women in Politics Club, lead singer of First Wave, usually has a bandana in her pocket, her backpack has a huge Sleater Kinney patch on it, and--”

“I think Leslie lives in a co ed dorm.”

“Impossible,” he sighed.

The girl who thought she knew Leslie better than he did walked toward the door. “She does. She’s an RA there. All the guys are supposed to meet with her three times a semester for feminist workshops.” The girl rolled her eyes and Ben wanted to shake her for both rolling her eyes and for knowing more about Leslie than he did. “They hate it.”

“They’re idiots.”

“Hey, one is my boyfriend you creep.”

“Which building?”

She pointed. “Rossmor.”

He turned and headed towards the building. He wouldn’t be able to get into that one either and no one was lingering in the lobby to let him in so he waited. The binder in his backpack felt too light. Maybe he didn’t prepare enough. He only had a few spreadsheets. Maybe she already had the budget figured out and his efforts were useless.

“Are you waiting to murder young women?”

Ben picked up his head and saw April walking towards him. Her hair was now a deep red. She smacked bubblegum in her mouth as she walked. 

“No. I’m looking for Leslie. Does she live here?” He knew his voice was shaky but April was actually a little scary.

“Are you going to murder her?”

“No.”

April put her key into the door with a click and Ben felt his chest tighten. “Then why are you here?”

“I have some ideas for the dance.”

April rolled her eyes and opened the door. She watched him, her dark eyes poring into his. He swallowed and waited. She blew a small bubble and tapped the side of the door with her finger. 

“Well, after you,” she said.

“Oh,” he chuckled nervously. “Got it.”

He walked in and April took the stairway. He looked around the lobby, two different hallways and a staircase making him feel like Alice in wonderland.

“To the left.” April yelled from above. 

He looked at different dorm room doors, littered with pictures or notes or school pride paraphernalia. He tried to look for something that Leslie would leave on her door, maybe pictures or band stickers or maybe the 19th Amendment. But on her door was just her name with Residential Adviser under it.

Ben knocked three times and waited.

“Come in!” Her voice sounded so soft on the other side of the door.

He turned the knob and there she was in the middle of a disaster zone.

Leslie was being swallowed by papers scattered around her, a model of the student union building, countless rolls of streamers and sketches of what he could only assume were decorating plans. Her bed was covered in more work, some text books, and more paper. How was there so much paper everywhere? Her desk was clean of anything except two rows of photos, one of female politicians and one of friends and family. Ann’s bed was made and clear except for a boom box that was softly playing some music that sounded like a lot of guitar and a lot of female screaming. There was a shelf of old drumsticks and guitar picks and broken guitar strings. On Leslie’s headboard was a broken guitar neck.

He cleared his throat, his eyes still not done taking it all in.

“Oh, hi, Ben.” 

He looked back at her. She smiled, surprised to see him, her bangs falling in front of one eye. He wanted to walk in but there was nowhere to step, and everything looked important and put somewhere for a reason. He tried anyway and stepped on a pile of kazoos, the plastic crunching under his feet.

“Oh, sorry.”

“It’s okay,” she said. She carefully stood up and brushed off her pajama pants. They had small horses on them. “How are you?”

Her eyes on him were refreshing. He felt a need to see her laugh and it all felt stupid and ridiculous. He just hadn’t seen her for a long time.

“I’m good. You look busy.”

“Yes.” Leslie nodded, looking around the room. She put her hands on her hips. “My room is a mess, did you want to go somewhere else?”

“No, no.” He didn’t. This room screamed Leslie, being here after not seeing her for a long time felt like a dunk in a cold body of water on a hot day. “It’s nice in here.”

She beamed. “Okay, well.” She looked around and smoothed a stack of books over on her bed. “There.” She sat back in her spot on the floor and Ben slowly maneuvered his way to her bed and had a seat. His weight made papers fall to his lap. 

He took his backpack off and put it in his lap, opening it. The binder felt so light in his hands, Leslie beat him in quantity. He took his beanie off and shook his hand through his hair.

“I heard you’re having a hard time with the end of the semester ball.”

Leslie didn’t look up but he saw her shoulders rise. “Yes. The clubs get equal allowances no matter what. Even if your club is putting on the ball. It’s a student run thing, it isn’t seen in the eyes of the faculty or Student Life as a real thing even though the school community expects it every year. So, clubs like the Game Board Club, who really just sit in a room and play board games, get the same amount of money as clubs like mine. Clubs that do more than that.” Leslie picked up a paper and skimmed it. “I like games but it costs almost $0 to have a game night.”

“What about sodas?” He grinned.

Her head whipped to him. She raked her eyes over him before she smiled back. “You’re kidding.”

“I am.”

Her eyes fell to the binder in his arms. “What’s that?”

“My ideas for the budget.”

“How did--”

“My roommate is Chris Traeger.”

Leslie’s eyes widened and he didn’t fight the warmth that went through his body. He never could shock her. Even when he figured out math problems, she was too busy trying to remember everything and understand his words to take it all in. This felt different. Like he had surprised her and she was ready to take his help instead of struggling to keep up with it.

“May I?” he asked, gesturing to the floor. 

Leslie nodded and moved some streamers and the model of the student center out of the way so he could sit next to her. His knee bumped hers as he crossed his legs and when he leaned closer to her to open the binder in front of them he smelled it, her vanilla shampoo. He took in a breath and saw her finger with red chipped nail polish over his philosophy book, trying to speak through laughs while she tried to explain a theory that wasn’t clicking for him. He saw numbers and equations and red marks over a test. 

“So... what am I looking at?”

She nudged Ben with her elbow and he came back to the present, to her room. The incredibly cluttered, organized mess of inspiration that was Leslie Knope’s room.

“Right.” He flipped a page.

He explained everything. He explained how he learned the ball budget actually came out of the club’s original money they are awarded from Student Life. That every club gets the same allowance each semester and it’s small and seen as a gift from the department. He knew that Leslie was right, that some clubs like The Board Game Club got the same amount of money as the rest of them and that they didn’t need it.

Leslie needed to get that unused money if she wanted to put on the ball he knew she wanted to. A big one. She had a binder full of end of the semester ball ideas: balloon drop, live band, decorations (ice sculpture was crossed out but then written back in ten lines down), someone named L’il Sebastian, a photo booth, and the list went on for pages. He had to talk her down from magicians (“No one over the age of three likes magicians, Leslie.”) and unrealistic blue prints to actually expand the student center so she could fit a shark tank into the building (“I know it’s silly but it would be so cool, Ben!”). To get the money for everything she wanted, everything she swore the dance needed, she had to rally with the other clubs to gain their extra collateral. And a fundraiser or two wouldn’t be a bad idea. She agreed and pulled out another clean binder, full of blank lined paper that she quickly filled with ideas. Leslie shoved a notebook into Ben’s hands and told him to write her the first draft of “an inspiring speech”. 

She pushed paper and sample decorations out of her way and laid down on the floor. She stretched her back and cracked her neck before she went back to writing down ideas. Her hand was quick across the paper, grabbing highlighters to color code her fundraising ideas from her rally ones. Leslie flipped pages when they were full, and when she paused to think, she pulled her hair into a pony tail with her hands and let it go. He watched the locks weave between her fingers and fall along her cheeks and the back of her neck. She caught his eye and stuck her tongue out at him before turning back the binder, a buzz pulsing through him. He rolled his neck and went back to work on her speech.

While he thought about his words, his eyes caught a stack of Disney movies she had under her desk. Ben teased her and she kicked his leg and told him to shut up. She dug into her box of VHS tapes and grabbed a documentary about unions that Leslie recorded off of cable. He told her about the awful toys that his little sister had from the commercials on the tape and Leslie told him to be quiet when he needed to pay attention. They ate Sweetums Pie Tarts and at some point he made her pop in Sleeping Beauty. Ben waited for her to roll her eyes at Prince Phillip’s frail attempts to woo Aurora or to yell at the TV for Aurora to wake up and get stuff done herself, but she never did. 

“When I was growing up, Aurora was my favorite. My dad used to tell me that she had beautiful blonde hair like me.” 

She touched her hair and kept her eyes on the screen. Ben didn’t know what to say, she looked so delicate and unlike the girl he watched jump around on stage or furiously argue the need for $20 to get L’il Sebastian (who was a magnificent mini horse, apparently) at the ball. She wasn’t even the girl he saw fawning over Mark. Just a nostalgic woman who held something dear to heart. It was soft and intricate but it was still Leslie, full of emotion, passionate, caring, and war torn. It was Leslie Knope, just for a different cause. 

He watched her pull her knees into her chest and wrap her arms around her legs. Ben wanted to hug her and he wasn’t sure why. Maybe for letting him into this side of her or maybe just to comfort her. Her eyes were sad while she watched the screen but when he offered to put on a different movie she protested. Ben’s limbs fell asleep so he moved to her bed, rubbing his thighs and tapping his toes to bring his legs back to life. Leslie stayed in the middle of the floor, the binder at her feet while she watched the TV in a tight cocoon of sad nostalgia. 

While Phillip fought the dragon, Ben’s eye lids got heavy and he felt his body sway as he pulled himself from sleep again and again. The movie went in and out and it wasn’t until the credits rolled that he figured he should just get up and leave. But he suddenly felt heavy and exhausted, unable to move.

The door opened and Ben blinked to get his eye muscles working again. Ann swayed in the doorway. 

“Ben is on your bed,” Ann slurred. 

Ben shot up from the bed and crinkled something beneath his feet. Ann took a shaky step inside the room and closed the door dramatically. Leslie stood up and grabbed Ann’s arm. She fell into her and kissed Leslie’s cheek. Ben looked away.

“You’re drunk.”

He heard Leslie move things out of their path to Ann’s bed. Ann fell onto the mattress and extended her arms to Leslie. 

“I kissed three boys tonight,” Ann mumbled. Ben turned to them.

“Were they cute?” Leslie asked, pulling on the covers. Ann squirmed to let Leslie pull the covers down. Leslie flattened the blanket over Ann and rubbed the inside of her wrist.

“I’ll go.” Ben grabbed his bag and stuffed his beanie in his back pocket.

“No, no, she’ll be asleep in like two minutes,” Leslie whispered.

He glanced at Ann’s bedside table. “I should go, it’s 1AM.” 

“Two minutes.” Leslie put up two fingers, her other hand still tracing circles on Ann’s wrist. “I’ll walk you out.”

So he waited. He rocked on his heels, eyeing the list Leslie left open in her binder. Cupcake sale was crossed out and waffle sale was written next to it. Ben traced patterns in the floor with the toe of his shoe.

Leslie tapped his shoulder and he turned. She put a finger to her lips and tip toed out of the room, Ben following her down the hall.

“Thank you for... everything.” Leslie nudged his shoulder. He looked at her as she yawned. 

“You’re welcome. It was fun.” Ben looked at his feet. He stopped by the door. “I mean, numbers are fun, I like numbers.”

Leslie smiled and crossed her arms, the cold slipping through the cracks in the doorframe. “Well, good. No matter how I try, they don’t like me.”

“I’m sure that’s not true.”

She shook her head to get her hair out of her face. “We both know they don’t,” she said. He chuckled, trailing his eyes back to the floor. Her socks didn’t match. “Anyway, thank you. Walk home safe, Benjamin” - her nose scrunched as she shook her head - “Ben.”

He leaned back on the door and grabbed the knob behind him. “Okay Leslieman, Leslie.”

Leslie grinned, tilting her head. Ben turned the nob and pushed through the door. She tightened her hold on her arms as the cool air rushed in. He took a few steps backwards into the cold night air and watched the door shut. Leslie waved at him through the window and he smiled. The chill bit his neck and ears so he grabbed the beanie out of his pocket and pushed it over his head, stumbling over a sprinkler head in the grass. Ben caught himself, skipping a little to balance himself. He looked back up at the window and Leslie was giggling, her hand over her mouth. Ben shook his head, dramatically covering his face. Her hand fell and he saw her smile grow, her teeth poking through her pink lips. He motioned that he was okay and waved. She returned his wave and Ben spun around, laughing to himself. 

He shoved his hands in his pockets as he walked across the lawn. The frost sept through his shoes but the chill never reached the rest of his body. He relished in the sight of his breath in the air, turning his head as he breathed to see it through the moonlight or in direct line with the artificial light from the buildings. Even though he was exhausted, he felt awake and excited for something. Maybe finally showing Leslie his ideas and her loving them, or working outside the ASC with Leslie, or being shown new things and thinking of new strategies that he couldn’t do alone. He unlocked the door and pulled his beanie off, quickly warmed by the heated hallway. 

Ben pushed through his door and tried to adjust his eyes to the darkness. He heard Chris’s soft breathing while Ben blinked, closing the door behind him. He stumbled to his bed and when he sat down on the mattress, he heard the crinkle of paper beneath him. He toed off his shoes, feeling the exhaustion seep through his body. He fell onto his pillow and reached under him until he felt paper. Ben grabbed his reading light hanging from a beam above him and clicked it on. He squinted into the new flood of light and flattened the paper in his hands.

_I finished editing early and thought we could get ice cream bars but you weren’t here and Chris didn’t know where you were. Let’s try another night. Miss you. ~ Shauna_

He should have went by the journalism lab to see how she was doing. He should have seen if she would be free, if she wanted to watch a movie or drink hot chocolate. He should have been in his room for Shauna to find him. They would have gotten ice cream bars and raced back to his dorm to eat them in the comfort of his heated room. He should have invited her to sleep over and kept sneaking his hand up her shirt while he tried to fall asleep, her giggles vibrating in his chest. He should have been with her tonight. But he wasn’t.

He struggled to feel bad, to accept the regret that was supposed to be crawling through his body, but he never did.


	4. Chapter 4

For the next few days, the journalism lab became Ben’s second home.

He sat in a corner while Shauna worked. She took small breaks to kiss his cheek or run her nails along his neck. He would smile and shiver, his eyes locked on Leslie’s 10th draft of her speech for the club rally. Ben kissed Shauna into the night, his work abandoned on his small desk in the corner and Shauna’s editing forgotten. He went with her to go see The Scarlet Letter, and he slicked his hair down like she liked, and gave her three pink roses. Shauna raked her fingers up and down his thigh through the movie and kissed his neck during the love scene. After she threw him down on her bed that night, he resolved to take her out more often.

Ben left romantic notes on Shauna’s door before walking to the ASC to work on finalizations for the club rally. Leslie usually whirled in like a hurling tornado, hair wild and bags full to the brim with binders, notebooks, and decorations. They worked together, taking 15 minute breaks to do homework. 

The day before the club rally, Ben noticed Leslie’s math progress began to slip again. He pushed her to spend more and more time on her calculus homework while he was around to help her. 

“I need you for this budget stuff.”

“No, Leslie,” he said, “you need me for calc.”

“Fine!” She threw her hands up, falling onto the binder in front of her. “I need you for both.”

A warm buzz smoothed through him as he smiled. He shifted his gaze to her, brow furrowed and opening her text book, pushing her ball idea binder out from in front of her. He pulled his gaze back to his spreadsheet he was designing for the rally results.

“I need your--”

“Brilliant mind? Inspiring quotes? Creative impulse?” 

He nodded. “Yep.”

Leslie tapped him on the shoulder with her pencil, a self satisfied smirk creeping onto her lips. She looked back to her book, ripping a piece of paper out of her notebook. She wrote down a problem and sighed before trying to work through it.

“Do you want to go to a Saints of Nothing show with me after the rally?” Leslie asked. She bit her lip in thought, scribbling her first try across the page. 

Ben’s throat dried. His last experience at a Saints of Nothing show was not one he wanted to relive. However, the familiar twist in his heart at her asking him to do something other than homework or budget balancing made him want to say yes. He would rather go to a First Wave show, he would rather see her perform on stage, not perform for Mark. Mark, who didn’t pay her an ounce of attention, who talked to Ben like they shared some secret tolerance for her, Mark who somehow had some sick hold on Leslie because he fucked her two years ago. Leslie was worth more than what she succumbed to around Mark, she should like a guy who gave a shit about her. Who liked the way she took everything with a strong passion, who admired her work ethic, who thought the causes she fought for were just. Who wanted to stand by her instead of two steps ahead of her. That person wasn’t Mark.

“I have plans.” Ben cleared his throat. “With Shauna.” 

He had no plans with Shauna but he should be making some and keeping them. Shauna wouldn’t be some one she wasn’t around him and the only thing he would fight her attention for is the newspaper, not a smug vintage elementary school t-shirt wearing asshole. 

“Oh.” Leslie turned her pencil over and erased a line of numbers. “How is Shauna?”

“She’s good, she’s busy. She’s taking over for the editor. He got mono.” 

“That’s great. Shauna is an amazing journalist.” 

“She is.” Ben tried to remember the last article she wrote but he wasn’t coming up with anything. 

Ben uncapped a Sharpie and traced the lines for his rows and columns. The strong smell reminded Ben of Leslie’s notes on her wrists or the time she felt like writing a quote on the thigh of her jeans.

“If we mean to have heroes, statesmen, and philosophers, we should have learned women.” Ben recited, his hand steady on the lines.

Leslie’s pencil stopped. “Abigail Adams.”

Ben nodded. “You wrote it on your jeans after I told you that I couldn’t believe you were good at philosophy.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw her head turn toward him. He focused on his hand gliding across the paper. Ben wasn’t the guy Leslie deserved, but he could remember moments he cherished with her. Mark couldn’t, Mark wouldn’t even want to. Leslie turned back to her paper and they worked in silence. She periodically asked him for help and after Ben finished tracing lines, he opened his philosophy book. 

He could outline an example of the Socratic method, he really could, but he hadn’t heard Leslie’s voice reach that pitch it did when she was frustrated that he couldn’t grasp her words in a long time. So he asked for help. 

//

Ben arrived an hour early to the club meeting and found Leslie there, straightening snacks on a long table along the back wall. Each seat had a place marker on it with each club’s name on the middle with the corresponding president’s name underneath. He didn’t remember talking about place holders but it did look very official. Leslie’s usual tight jeans and reconstructed shirt was replaced by a pantsuit that could probably be found in Hilary Clinton’s closet. A pair of short heels clicked on the floor every time she moved. He watched her work, blowing her bangs out of her face every time she found a cookie display to be unsatisfactory. 

“How long have you been here?”

Leslie jumped and spun, tripping over her feet. She leaned against the table as her hand clutched her chest.

“Crap on a cluster fluff, you scared me.” She took a deep breath. “Since two.”

“But you have calc at two.”

“This is more important.”

He tilted his head. “Leslie.”

She waved her hand at him and turned back around, lining up water bottles. Ben walked up to the snack table and grabbed a cookie. She glared at him and rearranged the plate, compensating for his stolen treat. He watched her work. First she arranged the snacks, then practiced standing behind the podium, and then she sat down on the president of the Knitting Club’s chair and read and reread her notes. Leslie kept pulling on her blazer and rolling her shoulders, wincing every time she tried to stretch. At some point she took off her shoes and he found them sitting behind the podium.

“When you’re president, you’ll have to wear heels all the time.”

“When I’m president, I will wear whatever the hell I want.”

She flicked her eyes off the paper and up at him. They shared a grin before Ben cleared his throat and pushed his attention back to the cookies.

Soon club presidents started showing up, gathering around snacks and water bottles. Ben watched everyone greet Leslie, some exacerbated by her excitement and pep while others kindly shook her hand and had polite conversation. Some looked excitedly at their place holders while others sat right on top of them. Ben walked around, a folder in his hand of the numbers he may need after Leslie’s speech. He checked to see what club presidents didn’t show up and marked his spreadsheet accordingly. As he checked empty seats, he overheard two people talking.

“This seems a bit much.”

“It’s Leslie, what do you expect?”

“I know, but she could have just asked me.”

Ben felt his gut fall to the floor. Was this too much? He looked around the room, some patrons laughing while others awkwardly waited for Leslie to take the podium. All the work he put into this, all the time he spent with her while she freaked out about snacks and the guest list never seemed like too much. It seemed like not enough, that they could have worked until the very last minute and all of it was worth it, needed, necessary. It wasn’t until now, listening to club presidents talk, that he thought that maybe this wasn’t what was needed to get the extra money. Maybe they could have just approached the presidents personally and asked for their extra money. 

“Ben!” 

He looked up and his eyes widened.

“Shauna,” he said. She walked up to him and kissed his cheek, the pencil over her ear poking his hair. “You heard about this?”

“Of course. If Leslie Knope is involved, chances are I’ve been told about it.” She whispered, her eyes following Leslie. Something about the way she said it reminded him of Mark’s tone the night he watched Leslie swoon over him. It didn’t sit well in his stomach. 

“Shauna!” Leslie walked as quickly as she could in her heels. “Thanks for coming. This way.” Ben just noticed the far corner, front seat that had Shauna’s name on it. Shauna sat down and smiled at Leslie as she frantically explained what would be happening. Shauna nodded but didn’t write anything down until Leslie walked away.

“Thanks for telling her to come.” Leslie whispered, walking up to Ben.

“I didn’t.”

“I know, I did.” Leslie winked at him and pushed his arm. “Introduce me.”

Ben didn’t know he was introducing her but he did as he was told. He shakily walked up to the podium and cleared his throat.

“Thank you for coming.” Shauna looked at him and arched an eyebrow, her head tilting with curiosity. “Um, as you know, the end of the semester ball is presented by one club each fall. This year, the ball is sponsored by the Women in Politics Club. Ladies and gentleman, the Women in Politics Club president, Leslie Knope.”

Leslie walked up to the podium and grabbed his shoulder and he felt a heightened sense of Shauna’s eyes on them. “Not bad.” She squeezed and let go before plopping her speech onto the podium. Ben walked away and pulled an empty chair next to Shauna, who’s eyes stayed on Leslie.

“Reaching out to each and every one of IU’s clubs is a first and I’m proud to see all of you in this room here today,” Leslie started. Ben felt his heart swell at his words, practiced and written over and over until it was how she wanted them, coming out of her mouth. They were strong and certain. “Clubs do not need to work in isolation, but should work as a unit, each one a part of a whole that helps students become involved in their school community.”

Ben smiled. He clasped his hands together in his lap while he watched. She looked so different, so grown up and as if she was a million miles above everyone else in the room. Leslie recited the numbers they needed to reach, the proximation of how much some clubs used, leaving a considerable surplus when combined. She gave them hints of what to expect at the dance if they could reach their goal and welcomed anyone’s help if they wanted to volunteer for fundraising or dance staff. 

“One club is picked to put on this dance. But no club should have to work alone, we should work together to achieve something greater.” Leslie shifted her eyes to Ben and then back to the crowd. “Thank you.”

Ben started clapping first and the room erupted after him. Leslie beamed and her cheeks turned a sweet crimson. He looked around the room to see the response, a majority clapped for her, some looked bored, and some in the back were playing hand held video games. He turned back to Shauna and she was writing, her eyes following her pencil. Once the clapping slowed, Leslie spoke again.

“If you would like to contribute to the fund with any extra money your club may have, Ben Wyatt” - she motioned toward Ben and everyone looked his way - “or I would love to hear about it. Any questions can be directed at either of us. Thank you.”

Leslie walked from around the podium and was immediately greeted by a group of girls and Ben looked at Shauna.

“I didn’t know you were helping Leslie with this,” Shauna said.

“Oh well.” He coughed. “I was tutoring her in math--”

“I knew that.”

“Yeah and she needed budgeting help for the ball.”

“The ball you’ve never been to.”

“Yes.” He looked down and watched his fingers smooth over his palm. Shauna sounded so neutral. Like everything she was saying should be a question but they were coming out as statements. 

“Well.” Shauna stood up and smoothed her shirt down before pushing her pencil on her ear. “I think I have everything I need.” She started for the door.

“Wait.” Ben reached and grabbed her elbow. She spun around and Ben wanted to kiss her, to give himself some faith that nothing was wrong, that things were fine, that he could sit in the journalism lab tonight and kiss her every half hour. He pushed forward.

“What?” she asked.

“Uh, I just. What are you doing tonight? I thought we could--”   
“I’m busy.”

He felt his chest tighten and his limbs sizzle. “Oh.” He shrugged and smiled desperately. “We can even just hang out in the journalism lab, I like lab dates.” He reached for her hand before he felt a tap on his shoulder.

“Ben?” Ben turned his head and saw some girl he didn’t know in a neon pink sweatsuit. 

“Yes, can you hold on a minute?” He asked before turning around to Shauna.

“Looks like you’re busy, too,” Shauna said, taking two steps back before turning on her heels and walking out the door.

“What?” Ben yelled, turning around.

The girl looked at him, surprised by his tone. “Lose the attitude, I am here to offer you money. The Treat Yo Self Club uses a lot of money but a dance is the ultimate treat for man meat, if you know what I’m sayin’.”

Ben shook his head, trying to push the conversation with Shauna out of his mind. “Great, yes.” He walked back to his chair and picked up his folder, opening it.

Some presidents left with out giving anything but a lot stayed around to contribute and volunteer as staff for the dance. Ben and Leslie worked on gathering everyone’s information and meeting times. It was overall successful but Ben felt terrible, guilty, and like a piece of shit, and he was mad he couldn’t enjoy this moment with Leslie.

Leslie waved goodbye to the last patron and started to throw away some trash. “Well that went well.”

Ben nodded, scooping up leftover cookies into their container. He moved on to the chairs and started stacking them, throwing away place holders as he went. It felt good to pick them up and slam them down on top of each other. He pushed piles against the wall before he returned to stacking. He should have told Shauna. He couldn’t think of why he didn’t, and his anger at himself made him slam a chair down, the sound in his ears and the vibration in his arms satisfying. He grabbed another. But, what was she mad about? He was just working on a budget problem. If she was mad about budgets then that was her problem because balancing budgets might be his career. He pushed another stack back. He didn’t do anything wrong, he just helped out a friend. Shauna was always busy, always doing stuff for the paper, why couldn’t he have his own life? 

He grabbed another chair, but Leslie put her hand on it.

“Hey what did these chairs ever do to you?” She smiled tentatively. 

He took a breath and Leslie grabbed the chair and stacked it on top of another. She did the last row while he controlled his breathing, wiping the sweat off the back of his neck. Ben shoved his hands in his pockets and paced. He should go to the journalism lab. He should do whatever Shauna wants to do tonight, to convince her that he was just helping a friend, to tell her he wanted to be with her tonight and no one else. Ben knew he owed her that.

Leslie tried to push the stack of chairs to the back wall but her shoes slipped from under her, her small frame wobbling before she caught herself. She tried to push again. She looked at him, her nose scrunched.

Fuck it. If Shauna could walk away, pissed off, he could go out tonight, pissed off.

“I am free to go to the Saints of Nothing show tonight.”

//

When Leslie and Ben walked up to Mark’s truck, Ben wanted to back out. When Mark got behind the wheel and Leslie eagerly slipped across the seat to the middle, Ben thought he was going to throw up. However, nothing could prepare him for the image of Mark winking at her as he shifted gears between Leslie’s legs.

Ben gripped the door handle and concentrated on switching pressure from each finger. He kept his eyes down or out the window and tried to block out Leslie’s higher pitched voice, the way she giggled unnaturally, or how Mark tried to ask Ben about his life.

“So what do you do, Ben?”

Ben closed his eyes so no one could see him roll them. What did he do? Was Mark already forty years old?

“Go to college?”

“Well, yeah. I just mean what’s your major, what do you do?”

“Oh, Ben is an accounting and economics major. He’s been helping me with the end of the semester ball.” Leslie chimed in, nudging Ben with her shoulder. 

“Ah, got roped into one of Leslie’s campaigns?” Mark said, his mouth pulled in a small smile.

“I offered to help.” Ben mumbled. He felt his blood boil through his fingers. He gripped the door handle until his fingertips turned white.

Mark nodded and they drove on in periodic silence. Leslie filled Mark in on the club meeting and her ideas for the ball. Ben noticed she cut some details out and made light of her hard work in front of Mark. It was sickening to listen to and Ben bit his tongue. He wasn’t here to make Leslie look better for Mark, Mark already made up his mind. As time kept ticking by, uncomfortably smashed between steel and Leslie’s body, Ben started to wonder how far this place was. He also wasn’t sure why Leslie wanted him on this obviously very romantic day trip. 

They pulled off the highway and Ben tried to find his bearings. He still didn’t know Indiana that well but he knew they were out of Bloomington by a good 30 minutes. In what direction, he had no idea, he was busy keeping his attention on the stickers on the glovebox or counting the flashes of headlights as they zoomed by.

When they parked, Ben hopped out of car and smoothed his hands down his jeans. The air was cool and biting his skin so he shoved his hands in his pockets and popped the collar of his jacket, keeping his eyes away from the other two. 

“Oh, it’s cold.” Leslie said, smoothing her hands over her arms. 

“Should’ve brought a jacket,” Mark said.

Ben rolled his eyes and looked back. Mark was unloading his drum kit while Leslie watched, bouncing up and down on her toes to keep warm. He wanted to give Leslie his jacket but he wasn’t her boyfriend, he wasn’t the man she was trying to flirt with, he was just her friend. So he zipped up his jacket and headed toward the coffee shop.

The warmth inside made him feel even worse about not offering his jacket to Leslie. He unzipped it and shrugged it off, draping it over the back of an armchair. A band was currently setting up onto a taped off square near the bathrooms. Ben ordered a coffee and stirred in sugar before sitting in the chair. He looked at the bookshelf of warn, offered books, not recognizing any titles except a copy of The Lord of the Flies that looked like it had been taped together a dozen times. He couldn’t figure out why he came here. As each minute ticked on alone, filled with sound checks and music he didn’t like, he really couldn’t figure out what brought him here. He should be with Shauna, but if he was telling the truth, he didn’t want to be with her either. He can handle being mad at himself, but having her mad at him too sounded horrifying.

The first band finished and he saw Leslie and Mark walk in. She was still rubbing her arms and he could see the rattle in her jaw. 

“Leslie.”

She turned and her cold, red cheeks plumped as she smiled. He was surprised she stopped, that she heard him at all. Mark carried his bass drum to the stage while a few of his bandmates followed. Leslie held up her finger to him and Ben thought she was going to follow Mark but she just ordered a drink. She put two dollars down on the counter and walked toward him.

“Hey.” 

Ben looked around the room for another chair for her. He started to get up.

“Oh, no. I’m going to go up front for their set anyway.” 

Ben slowly sat down. The barista walked over to them with a large mug full of what Ben could only assume was whipped cream. She stuck her finger in the top and scooped out a glob, plopping it into her mouth as she sat on the arm of his chair. Leslie licked her finger clean, her lips puckering. When she grinned at him, a smear of whipped cream sat in the corner of her mouth. He looked away.

Leslie continued to scoop out whipped cream, eventually taking a sip. “Hot chocolate,” she explained, and as she sipped and sat with him, her body began to stop trembling and her cheeks turned to their natural shade. She never needed his jacket.

The guitarist of Saints of Nothing strummed a few chords and Leslie put her drink down next to Ben’s on the small side table. She touched his shoulder to excuse herself and walked towards the front, angling herself perfect to view Mark. Ben watched her. She moved her feet, crossing her legs at her ankles and back again in anticipation. Her Doc Martens were still their brilliant bright red and her jeans were speckled with rips. She looked at her chipping black nails but he could see her eyes slide to Mark periodically. Her sweatshirt, her impractical sweatshirt, had L7 across the back in letters that looked like they were spray painted on. Her hair covered the top part of the seven. She pushed her hair off her neck and made a pony tail with her fingers before letting go and Ben looked away, reminded of their late night brainstorming session and movie marathon.

Ben took another sip of his coffee as the lead singer announced their name and Mark hit his drumsticks three times. A small crowd gathered around them and they started nodding their heads immediately, finding the rhythm before Ben could even put it together. Ben tapped his foot as he cradled his mug, sipping as the set went by with songs that were called especially mopey things like “Summer’s Gone, So Are You” and more “woahs” between verses than necessary. 

Leslie watched them take down their instruments and she carried a few drums out to Mark’s truck. When Leslie walked back inside, she came by to take a swig of her hot chocolate. She asked Ben if he was having fun and he nodded, sipping the last bit of his coffee. By the time she got back to Mark, he was already talking to three girls, all with baseball t’s and Chuck Taylors. They laughed at Mark’s words and he sold them each a CD and gave one a free t-shirt. Seeing Leslie watch him was heartbreaking. Leslie was a powerful feminist with enough vigor and spirit to get anything done, to run a whole country some day, but she still was capable of being a girl with a crush on a boy. A boy who didn’t give a shit about her.

Ben put down his mug and stood up.

“Hey, do you want to split an eclair?” Ben grabbed her shoulder and squeezed it, and he smoothed a circle into the soft fabric of her sweatshirt without thinking of a reason not to. 

Leslie kept her eyes on Mark, but he could see her thinking. She looked at the girls in front of him and tried to force him to make eye contact with her but after a few beats, it didn’t happen, so she accepted Ben’s offer.

He let her eat more than half of their treat and somehow he got her laughing by making fun of the romance novel titles and covers. He read a passage or two and she kept swatting him in protest.

“What, this isn’t romantic? I believe the author called it, ‘his throbbing member’.” 

He felt ridiculous reading it and his cheeks were hot from using explicit words to detail love scenes to Leslie but she kept laughing. Her giggles were causing people to look at them and he just wanted to keep her that way. When the next band started he just made faces at the pages, and that was enough to keep her smiling, her laughs muffled by the noise. 

Leslie, trying to regain her breathing, leaned over and touched Ben’s forearm. “Be right back,” she yelled in his ear. 

He nodded and watched her disappear behind the band, into the ladies room. Ben realized sitting by himself with a romance novel looked terrible so he shoved it back on the shelf, confident that he cheered her up. He nodded with everyone else as the band played, caught up in the communal feel of the whole affair. Maybe this is what Leslie loved about being in a punk band, she was building, being a part of, and helping a community of people who believed in similar things. For Leslie it was feminism and a fight for a government for the people and for these people it was remembering heart break and celebrating love when it worked out. It was more than just listening to a certain type of music, it was everything else that came with it. It was special.

Ben felt a push against his thigh and looked up. Leslie’s eyes were huge and she looked frantic and out of breath. He straightened up and tried to grab her hands but she just pushed him away and waved for him to follow her. He grabbed his jacket and rushed out of the shop behind her.

“What’s wrong?” Ben asked, his voice high and frazzled. 

“Mark is gone!” Leslie yelled. She motioned toward the parking spot where Mark’s truck was parked, now empty.

“I’m sorry?” It wasn’t clicking in his head. Why would Mark leave? The show wasn’t even over yet and also, he brought two people with him.

“Mark left.” Her hand slapped back to her thigh and she looked at the sky.

“Maybe he’ll be right back.” Ben reasoned. Mark was definitely an asshole but he wasn’t this big of an asshole.

“No.” Leslie crossed her arms and her body curved to fight the chill. She shook her head. “He left with a girl. Paul told me.”

“What?” Ben felt the anger bubble down in his gut and started to sizzle his skin.

“Paul said Mark had to leave.” Leslie’s body shook but her words were steady. “Mark said I could get a ride with Matt but Matt already left.”

Ben pushed his hand through his hair and kicked a rock. “Oh well that was nice of him to find you a ride home.” He looked down. “He’s a dick.”

“Hey!” Leslie turned to him and her eyes flared. “He tried! Mark wouldn’t just leave me here.”

“Wake up, Leslie, he _did_ leave you here.” Ben saw his breath fog between them. A few teenagers watched them and others walked away.

“You’re an ass.” 

“Maybe.” She was right, he was. He spent tonight catching little bits of time with her instead of making things right with Shauna. “But at least I didn’t leave you at a fucking coffee shop.”

He stormed away and suddenly became aware of the fact that he had nowhere to go. He kept walking down the sidewalk, past closed antique shops and restaurants. He heard her boots behind him.

“You don’t get to yell at me.” Leslie’s voice echoed off the buildings and into the silent, night air. “You can’t be mad at me because you had a fight with your girlfriend.”

“I didn’t have a fight with Shauna.”

“Oh, you didn’t? Then how did you suddenly become available to go to this show? I’m not an idiot, Ben, I saw the way she looked at you today. You didn’t tell her you were working with me.”

“I don’t have to tell her everything!” He yelled, spinning around. Leslie almost bumped into him but steadied herself, taking a step back. 

Leslie’s chest rose and fell while her teeth chattered. Her breath appeared in a small cloud in front of her mouth. Her fingers were a pale white as they smoothed over her arms, trying to warm them. He groaned and took off his jacket and threw it at her. She caught it and slowly put it on. Seeing her in it made his heart beat faster and his pulse push through his veins and he wanted to scream.

“Mark will come back for us.”

Ben rolled his eyes. “No he wont. He brought you here to stroke his ego, ignore you, and then left to go fuck some girl.” Ben took a step closer to her. “And that girl wasn’t you.” 

He did it, he went too far. But his face felt so hot and his breaths were labored and rough and he couldn’t take it back, he didn’t want to take it back.

“You’re a jerk.” 

He could see the gloss in her eyes start to form and it reminded him of the night they watched Sleeping Beauty. She turned and stormed back to the coffee shop. He let her go, watched her as she became smaller and smaller until she disappeared inside the building. Ben scuffed his foot across the cement and yelled, a harsh low yell that shook his throat and echoed around him. He didn’t want to take his words back, they were harsh and mean but they were true. Mark didn’t want Leslie, and he didn’t fucking deserve her, and Ben just wanted her to know that.

He dragged his feet along the cement as he walked back. He couldn’t call Shauna for a ride and Chris didn’t have a car. Ben pushed open the door to the coffee shop and found it mostly deserted, the last band packing up and a few audience members milling around, grabbing coats and saying goodbye. He looked around the room for Leslie but he didn’t see her. He sat back in his chair and decided to wait. She was around here somewhere, like him, she had nowhere to go. So he waited.

No one told him to leave but the barista locked the door and wiped tables while he sat. He studied his hands, the bottom hem of his plaid shirt, the hole at the bottom of his sweater. The longer he sat, the more awful he felt. The weight of regret pushed him down and made his body feel empty and tired. He leaned forward and put his head in his hands, balancing his elbows on his knees. He rubbed his forehead with his finger tips and tried to will this feeling away. He went too far. He meant what he said, but he still went too far. He hurt Leslie. He did it. He couldn’t be mad at Mark for hurting Leslie, or mad at equations that didn’t make sense to her. He did this. He drove her away.

He felt a light touch on his shoulder and groaned in response. He waited for this moment, for the barista to tell him to leave, with nowhere to go. He couldn’t leave with out Leslie, she was hurt and lost and alone and it was all his fault. He owed her to stick around. To wait.

“Hey.” Leslie’s voice was shaky and light but he could hear her clearly. He turned his head and she was so close to him, like she had just whispered in his ear.

“Hi.”

She stood up and he straightened his back. He rubbed his head and looked at her. She was still wearing his jacket and had bloodshot eyes and wet cheeks and he wanted to hold her. He just wanted to hold her.

“Lacey, the barista, showed me a loft upstairs. She said we could sleep here tonight.” Leslie cleared her throat and tried to look anywhere but in his eyes but he craved hers. 

“Okay.”

“I got ahold of Ann, she’s at a party tonight so she shouldn’t drive. She’ll be here tomorrow. Lacey said she’ll let us out early in the morning.” 

Ben just nodded, trying to catch her gaze. 

“You guys okay?” Lacey walked up to the door and unlocked it. The cold air hit his face as she opened the door.

“Yes, thank you, Lacey. Really.” Leslie tilted her head towards Lacey and she smiled. The door clicked behind them and the harsh snap of the lock filled the silent room. 

Leslie looked at the floor and turned to walk away but Ben grabbed her hand and she stopped. 

“Leslie.” Her name felt raw and hard on his tongue. He smoothed his thumb over the top of her hand and squeezed. “I’m sorry.”

She squeezed back and his whole body warmed. She shook her head slowly and pulled. He stood up and she let go of his hand and he followed her.

They walked behind the counter to a dark corner where there was a narrow, wooden staircase. His steps made the wood creak and he felt the slats bend at his weight. The landing was bigger than he expected, but the ceiling was low. He had to duck down to walk around, Leslie just hunched her shoulders a little. There were a few large couch cushions scattered around the floor and in the far corner was a mattress. She walked over to a cushion and sat down, motioning for him to join her.

They sat in silence. Ben could hear her breathe and he tried to match her. Her inhales were shorter than his but they always came together in the exhale. Ben rested his head on the wall behind him and closed his eyes.

“You were right,” Leslie said, “about everything.”

“Leslie, I--”

“No, you were right. Usually I’m right, but this time you’re right.” He heard her swallow and her head laid back on the wall with his. “But it still hurt.”

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.” 

Leslie leaned her head towards his and he did the same. Their heads lightly touched and Ben inhaled, taking in her shampoo, the dust of the loft, and the coffee grounds from downstairs.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered again. She nodded against his head.

He tried to match her breathing again but his inhales were still too slow. He felt comfortable, the pain from earlier starting to seep away, leaving a faint pulse of guilt. Leslie snuggled into his jacket, her head never leaving his. He closed his eyes and put more weight against her as he started to feel heavy with exhaustion. He caught her breaths again. His hand slipped off his lap and he felt her pinky underneath his thumb as sleep began to claim him. He struggled to keep his breaths in line with hers. Her head felt heavy against his and he she inched lower and lower until her head fell to his shoulder. 

Soon her inhales became longer and longer. He took in a synced breath with her and his cheek slumped on top of her head. He took in one more matched breath and then fell asleep.


	5. Chapter 5

Ben woke up in a sea of pale yellow. 

He lifted his head and his neck seared in pain. He groaned, and let his head hit the hard wood of the floor, relief flooding him. Ben’s left side felt cold. He brought his left hand to his face and rubbed his eyes, trying to regain a sense of where he was. He blinked and focused on the low ceiling, a horizontal striped pattern of wood beams. The heaviness of sleep still crawled through him and it was hard to keep his eyes open. Light speckled in from the small window to his right. He craned his neck towards the sun.

Leslie was curled into his neck, her face pressed against his chest. Her hair was wild behind her, some strands littering his face and neck. He pushed her hair from his cheek and let his fingers linger on her locks. Her tiny frame was covered with his jacket, practically swallowing her. He felt the bump of her arm under his neck, which must be the result of his pain. Her other arm was around his waist, her thumb under his shirt while the rest of her hand laid against the top of his jeans, over his hip. His right arm was trapped under hers and his palm was open and flat against her leg that was slung over his other hip. 

The last he remembered they were leaning against a wall and now they were tangled so tightly that he couldn’t move. But he didn’t want to.

Ben gripped her leg and pulled it up so he could get a better hold. She adjusted against him, pulling her body closer. He slowed his hand as she mumbled about the 19th amendment and something about whipped cream. He waited for her breathing to slow again in its heavy rhythm before he moved his hand again, just a slow, short line back and forth across her thigh. He turned his head and buried his face in her hair and he laid that way, letting the sun slowly flood the room while his hand moved along her leg and his breaths filled with the scent of her hair.

He shouldn’t be touching her and they shouldn’t be lying like this but she was so peaceful and he felt so wonderful. Being enveloped by Leslie made his body warm and his stiff neck disappear. He moved to gain more access to her, slipping his hand up to her waist and down again and she adjusted accordingly, pushing her body tighter around him. Her hand slipped under his shirt and her fingers on his skin made him shiver. 

Her hand stopped and her breathing quickened as she woke. He stilled and waited, his hand wrapped around her knee, his fingers pushing on the inside bend of her leg. Leslie’s fingers were slow on his skin but she reached and gripped his side and he felt her muscles tighten as she held on to him. His trapped hand squeezed her leg and he wrapped his free arm around her and held on. They squeezed together, her muscles tightening and loosening before gripping him again while he just held on, just kept this moment for himself because he needed it. He had never felt this warm, this comfortable, this... perfect. 

The pang of guilt seeped into him, through his fingertips on Leslie’s leg, from his knuckles that were white from his tight hold. He really shouldn’t feel this way, he shouldn’t be giving in to it, and he should’ve moved as soon as he woke up. Ben sighed as Leslie adjusted against him and pulled on his side. He rolled toward her and kept his chin up, her head ducking underneath it. Her hair tickled his neck and a lock pushed down the collar of his shirt. Her arm awkwardly looped around his neck and her fingertips lightly grazed his hair. Ben needed to back out, he needed to pull away. He closed his eyes and willed himself to stop. To get his hand off her hip and move her leg off of his. Instead he pushed his knee between her legs and pushed their bodies together and held on.

She took in a big, deep breath and he felt her chest push against his stomach. Her breath was warm on his neck when she spoke.

“We should get up.” Leslie’s voice was rough with sleep and he groaned in response, pushing his lips into her hair. He needed to get out of this, he couldn’t do this, but he also couldn’t unwrap himself from her. Her arms tightened around him.

He nodded but his movement only made them cuddle closer, their bodies moving to adjust for the other’s touch. Leslie moved against his leg between hers and he almost jumped, almost left to find Ann and get out of here. To run away from the intoxicating aroma of coffee beans and vanilla and the feeling of her in his arms. But she moved again, her hips innocently smoothing against his leg to get closer and his hips moved in response and he swallowed the groan that was crawling up his throat.

“I was stupid,” she said, her voice low and muffled against his skin. He wanted to pull away and look at her but that would mean he would have to loosen his grip on her and he never wanted to do that. He should want to. He should very much want to. “About Mark.” 

Mark’s name made Ben stiffen in her arms and she snuggled into him. She moved her leg to hook around his. 

“I was a jerk. He just...” Ben closed his eyes. “He is awful, Leslie.” He moved his arm from her hip and over her hair, not allowing himself to feel her locks between his fingers. “He doesn’t care about you.”

Leslie loosened her arms around him and pulled back and he balled his hands into fists to keep from grabbing her. She was making the right move. This was getting out of hand and he needed to think of Shauna, he needed to remember that he wasn’t available to wake up tangled in another girl’s arms. Leslie pulled her arm from under his neck and pushed it behind her head. His eyes weaved across her face. Her eye makeup was a little smudged and her right cheek had an imprint of the stitching in his sweatshirt. 

She looked at him but quickly looked away, her legs untangling from his. “I know.” Leslie shook her head, slowly bringing herself to her knees. “Finally.” It came out with a laugh. 

He watched her stretch and rub the sleep from her eyes and he instantly missed her. Or the warmth of her. Or the comforting way she fit into him. He turned on his stomach and buried his face in his hands, pushing on his eyes until they hurt. He was such an idiot.

“When is Ann coming?” he asked, his words echoing in his palms. He needed to get out of here. He needed a shower. 

“Soon.” Leslie yawned. “Let’s go downstairs so we’re ready when Lacey gets here.”

Ben sat in the familiar armchair while they waited. Leslie sat in a separate chair, her eyes constantly busy on the small stack of board games on a shelf. He tried not to watch her, tried not to see her fingers disappear in the sleeves of his jacket or her leg bouncing. Ben dug his nails into the fabric of the chair and scratched the upholstery, the noise filling the silence. Leslie hummed and he tried to block it out, to just listen to his fingers. He willed his heart to beat louder, to pulse in his ear and block out the sound, but it didn’t.

Lacey rushed into the shop, rambling that she was sorry and that she was running late. Leslie thanked her and they waited outside for Ann. Ben kept his hands in his pockets and rocked on his heels while Leslie wrapped herself in Ben’s jacket and leaned against the building. He kept his eyes on the street lamps that were still illuminated despite the sunlight. 

“There she is,” Leslie said. Ben looked up and saw Ann’s car rolling down the road. He walked to the curb and waited for her to park. But she didn’t park. Her car came to a screeching halt and Ann jumped out of the car, face scrunched in anger, leaving her car abandoned in the street with the door wide open.

“What did you do?” Ann yelled, pointing at Ben.

She charged toward him and Ben frantically backed up until his back hit the building, his head smacking into the brick. He put his hands out and braced for whatever blow she was about to throw at him. Leslie grabbed Ann by the waist, wrapping her arms over her stomach and pulling. Ann folded in half, trying to grab for Ben, any piece of him. Through Ben’s panic, he heard the distant sound of Leslie yelling.

“Ann! No. It’s fine, Ann!” Leslie clutched her hands together to keep her hold on her best friend. Ben sunk into the wall, trying to hide in case Leslie lost her grip.

“What did you do to her?” Ann growled, one last pull toward him making Ben jump. “You can’t do this to her!”

“What?” Ben covered his face.

“Ann! Stop!” Leslie yelled. 

Ann took a few calming breaths and started to straighten up, keeping her eye on Ben while taking in Leslie’s embrace. 

“Ben didn’t do anything,” Leslie said. She turned Ann around to face her.

“You were crying! And you said he yelled at you.”

“He did,” Leslie admitted. She eyed Ben and then looked back to Ann. “But he was just mad. We both were. Because of Mark.”

“Don’t think I wont kill him, too.”

“Aw, Ann. You would kill for me.” Leslie pulled Ann into a hug and Ben looked away.

“Leslie.” Ann groaned.

They stood on the sidewalk and hugged. Ann stroked Leslie’s hair and Leslie kept her arms around Ann’s waist, even as they walked back to the car. Ben didn’t know if he should follow, if he was allowed to get a ride until Ann waved him over, apologizing as she got into the car. 

Ben fell asleep to the sound of Leslie filling Ann in on the events of the evening. Ann replied with the usual and appropriate gasps and “wow”s about Mark’s behavior. Sleep took over as Leslie explained how she came to the realization that Mark was a jerk and she was glad she finally figured it out.

Ann shook Ben awake and he blinked as he climbed out of the car. The world tilted around him, his limbs light in exhaustion. The girls waved to him and as they walked, linked arm in arm, Leslie looked back twice, her eyes sparkling in the sun but held something Ben couldn’t quite put his finger on. Sad but with something more.

He dragged his feet along the cement as he walked back to his own dorm, sloshing through the cool grass and damp leaves. He stomped his feet as he walked into the building, rubbing his face when he turned the corner. When he opened his eyes again, there she was.

Shauna.

Her hip was popped as she wrote against his door, her notebook against the wood. As he watched her, his heart beat faster, each second increasing the speed. He knew he should see her, that he needed to go to her, but he wasn’t prepared yet. She wasn’t supposed to be here. His palms began to sweat under his fingers and he realized Leslie still had his jacket. He blinked, pushing Leslie from his mind and he tried to focus. 

He took a step and she looked up. Her big brown eyes widened and she dropped the notebook and everything felt like it was being played in slow motion. She ran to him, her long brown hair flowing behind her and when she reached him, her arms wrapped around his shoulders and she squeezed. Ben slowly smoothed his hands around her waist and he hugged her. He closed his eyes against her hair and breathed her in. Shauna didn’t deserve the shit he did to her. Shauna was everything he should want, everything he could hope for. Shauna was better than him. 

Ben squeezed and she nuzzled her face into his neck and her lips sent goosebumps up his arms. She pulled away and Ben’s mind raced for what he should say, how he should say it, what he should do now. Something had changed but something was also keeping him here, in this moment, with Shauna, in her arms.

She pulled on his neck and kissed him. Her lips were fresh, the hint of toothpaste on her tongue. Ben wrapped his hands around the back of her neck and she opened her mouth against his. His hands smoothed to her jaw and his thumbs found the spot on her cheeks that dimpled when she smiled.

Shauna. 

Shauna deserved better.

She pulled away and her nails raked along the edge of his neck before she dropped her hands to his. 

“Ben,” she breathed, “I’m so sorry.”

His eyes widened and he opened his mouth to protest but she kept going.

“I was being unfair and ridiculous. I can’t believe I acted that way because you were helping a friend.” She shook her head and kissed him again, this time quick and apologetic. “I just thought, maybe--”

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, it was so stupid.” It was, he was, it all was.

“Let’s just forget it.” Shauna kissed him again, then on his cheek, then along his jaw and his hands fell to her waist and he gripped her hips. He closed his eyes as her lips moved to his neck and he wanted her to stop, to give him a second to explain everything, to be honest with her, honest with himself.

But Shauna was giving him a second chance. This was it, he could put these pieces back together and do it right. He could put everything back on track, back to before he was stealing glances at another girl, back to the place he needed to be. He was being a stupid guy, a guy with a wandering eye and no satisfaction. But he was here now, where he was supposed to be, with the uncomplicated girl who had long brown hair that he always liked and the long legs he always imagined his dream girl to have. Shauna was gracious and kind and smart and he was getting a second chance to be with her, to make things right.

“You smell like an attic.” She giggled, her teeth scraping his skin. She pulled away and tilted her head. Ben used to melt into a puddle of mush when she did that. Now it was just a comforting reminder of why he started to like her. “Where were you last night? I came by but I figured you were still mad so I let it be.”

“Oh,” he started. He looked into her eyes and she grinned in curiosity. “That drummer guy Mark had a show and I went with him and some friends.” Shauna nodded. “And we ran out of gas so we had to crash there.” The lie felt so natural as it fell out of his mouth.

“Who slept over?” He could hear the tone of worry in her voice, hidden by her forced adaptation of understanding.

“Just a few of us, Mark and Ann and Leslie and some random people.” He could feel the sweat begin to form at his temples and the pulse of his blood through his veins.

“Bummer.” 

Shauna’s weight shifted, the relief swimming through her. She smiled and leaned toward him, kissing him quickly on the mouth before pulling on his sweatshirt and licking down his neck. Ben closed his eyes and leaned his head back to give her more access to his skin. She asked if Chris would mind if they just made out on Ben’s bed and Ben shook his head and unlocked the door as her mouth attacked him. 

He felt the dull pain of guilt beat in his chest and vibrate through his body, escalating to his limbs. The guilt seeped into his fingers as he gripped Shauna’s belt loops to pull her closer, it fueled him to push his hand under her shirt, to kiss across her neck, and pull her hair to get her closer.

This was unfair, this was wrong, but he would make it right, he would fight to make this right. Shauna deserved that.

//

Ben walked into the ASC the next day and told Jerry he wouldn’t be coming in for the week. In his room he sat at his small desk and did his homework, read on his bed, and took short breaks to read some comics or play GameBoy. He grabbed coffees after his morning classes and took them to the journalism lab to work alongside Shauna. She smiled and took the coffee and Ben settled into a corner to do some more reading. 

He wasn’t the only one making an effort. He could feel Shauna pulling herself out of work more often to rub his arm or kiss his cheek. She would excuse herself to walk Ben to his next class and she would ask for him to meet her after one of hers so they could go to lunch together. Ben rented The Bodyguard and tried to cook her dinner in the dorm kitchen but she made out with him on the couch instead. Every time they were together, Shauna’s hands were on him; sliding across his stomach, tracing fingers across his arm, or a limp hand on his leg. She was always affectionate but it started to feel different. Ben noticed how often they held hands now and he wondered if they ever did before. 

On Halloween, Shauna surprised him with a Peter Pan costume to compliment her Tinkerbell one. They laughed as he put it on and it was the most natural he felt with her in a long time. Like he wasn’t trying to fix anything or undo his mistakes, just easy. Her legs were long in her short skirt and he helped her stick leaves onto her top and in her hair. She gave him a quick kiss before she applied her bright red lipstick. Ben looked in the mirror and straightened his hat and tried to pull down his shorts. The tights were uncomfortable and embarrassing but he saw the excitement in Shauna’s eyes and he couldn’t tell her no; not after she went through the effort of finding a costume for them to share. 

The air was cold on his green tinted legs as they walked together through the quad. A fraternity was throwing one of its legendary Halloween parties and Shauna got an invite from a guy who was another reporter for the paper. Girls ran by the front door in small outfits and guys kept fist bumping and shotgunning beers on the front porch. Their costumes were minimal and understated and Ben felt like a complete idiot. He crossed his arms as they walked in and he tried to stay behind Shauna, as if that would hide the ridiculous way he felt.

For the most part, Ben realized, people didn’t care what he was wearing. Girls were busy getting drunk and kissing each other to impress boys and boys were staring at practically naked girls. Ben found a few looking at Shauna but he never felt threatened. He was the one who put on this fucking costume, he won this round.

“I’m going to go see if Jason is here,” Shauna yelled over the music. Ben didn’t want her to leave, didn’t want to be alone in his costume that was only acceptable with a girl on his arm, but he nodded and watched her go.

Ben walked around the living room, trying to find a good spot to lay low and keep to himself. He didn’t like parties like this, huge and smelling of alcohol and cheap perfume, but Shauna insisted it would be fun and he was getting stir crazy spending all of his time in his dorm room or the journalism lab. So he agreed, and now here he was.

He grabbed a red solo cup that some guy just filled from the keg and found a spot on a stool near an ugly lamp that had to have been found on the side of the street or donated by some one’s mom. Ben sipped the beer and watched the party go on.

His tights were awful around his legs, the clenched fabric felt like it was cutting off his circulation and pulling on his leg hairs. He shifted in his seat and pulled on them, trying to release the tension. A leaf fell off of his shirt and he bent over to pick it up. He tried to push it back onto his costume but it kept falling. Ben tossed the leaf onto the ground and sighed, looking up as he took a sip of his beer.

And choked.

He hadn’t thought about her. He really tried not to. When she entered his mind, when he felt the tangle of her hair in his hands or the pressure of her leg on his waist, he pushed out the feeling, redacted the image. He was conditioned not to think about her anymore and he was becoming great at it. He was finally there. But there she was, like a fucking vision. Her presence parted the crowd perfectly so he could see her. 

A long, dark plaid skirt fell to the middle of her calf, her feet covered in a heeled boot. Her sweater was a dark green, white buttons clasped all the way to the collar. Her golden hair was styled like something out of a 1940’s black and white film and her face was natural and light, except for her red lips. She held a magnifying glass in one hand and a flashlight in the other and he saw a book under her arm.

Leslie turned and his breath caught in his throat but she didn’t see him. A girl ran up to her and gave her a hug and looked her over. The girl’s head tilted and Leslie pulled the book from under her arm and showed it to her. Ben squinted and saw the iconic cover. 

Leslie was Nancy Drew.

Ben lowered his head when she turned again and when he looked back up she was gone. His body relaxed and he sunk down, leaning over to rest his elbows on his knees. He willed his heart to slow down, to think nothing of seeing her but the process came with it’s usual difficulty. He was dressed like Peter Pan, his girlfriend was Tinkerbell somewhere in this party and he needed to get his shit together. He was supposed to be over this, he made a choice to be over her. To be over their one stupid night together in a dusty attic.

He swallowed the rest of his beer and walked outside, the air harsh in his lungs. He kept breathing, filling his chest with the cool air and letting it back out. He watched a girl puke in a bush and two guys sneak off together behind the house. Ben was starting to feel like he was better at watching people have fun than actually having it.

“There you are.” Shauna’s voice cut through him and he jumped. She stepped in front of him and he saw her eyes flared like he had never seen them before and his heart began to jump. “Come here.”

She grabbed his arm and pulled him down the steps from the porch to the sidewalk. She stopped near a streetlamp and the light was harsh on her face, glaring off her eyes in a way that made Ben want to look away but also called for his attention. He had never seen her this way.

“I’m going to give you one chance to tell me the truth.” Shauna’s voice was steady and strong, full of warning. 

Ben wanted to stop her, to ask what was wrong but the way her eyes bore into his made him quiet. He couldn’t say anything, this was her time, this was her moment to have, her questions that she deserved to ask. Each breath he took in was labored and he felt like gravity was pulling him to the ground. He touched the streetlight for balance, his fingers lightly grazing the metal. It was enough, it was enough to keep him standing.

“Okay,” he stammered. 

Shauna swallowed, hard and long like she was about to take a dive into water. “Who was with you the night you were abandoned after Mark’s show?”

He should tell the truth, he really should. He had this one chance, Shauna gave him one more chance to prove himself worthy of her. He pushed for air, for the words to come out but he couldn’t speak. His eyes frantically swarmed her face and she waited, tight lipped and stone faced. She didn’t move, waiting for his answer, waiting for her own confirmation. Ben clawed for words, he begged for honesty, but instead he was silent.

“Um,” he finally spat. The lump in his throat pushed against his tongue. She still waited. Patient Shauna, she would wait for the world. “Shauna.” He begged. He begged for her to understand, for her to know she wasn’t wrong here, for her to know she was worth so much more than him. He reached out to her and she moved, dodging his touch. He dropped his hand and gripped a leaf on his shorts before it crumbled and fell between his fingers.

“Who was with you?” She spoke slower, each word punched with anger. 

“Leslie.”

Shauna closed her eyes and took a calming breath before opening them again. They were wet but not spilling. 

Shauna, strong, beautiful Shauna wouldn’t let him see her cry.

“And who else?” she asked. She knew the answer. She fucking knew.

He swallowed again and felt the thump move down his throat and back up. He wanted to throw up. He was going to throw up.

“No one,” he said, “just Leslie.”

He felt it first and then heard it. Her palm stung his cheek and the sound of her skin against his flesh rang in his ears on infinite repeat. He opened his eyes and the street came into focus. No cars drove by but teenagers ran around the streets in costumes and yelled at their friends to join them. He blinked before turning back to her. Shauna wiped her cheek quickly and looked to the sky before she looked back at him. 

Shauna, hurt, wounded Shauna couldn’t help but let him see her cry.

Ben reached for her again and she pulled away quickly, taking a step back from him.

“You lied to me,” she said. Ben nodded. “Why did you lie to me?” Ben rolled his neck as his throat quivered. He looked down and watched her fist clench and he thought she was going to punch him. She should. “Why did you lie to me?” She begged, her voice growing.

A few people stopped and looked while others kept their distance. Furious Tinkerbell was mad at her Peter Pan, jealous of another girl, with every right to be. 

Shauna unclenched her fist before pulling her fingers together again. “You have feelings for her.” Nothing was a question anymore, it was just Shauna putting pieces together. 

Ben closed his eyes and let Leslie flash against his eyelids. Her on stage, her yelling about social change, her almost in tears over numbers, her in the mess of her dorm room, her talking about her father, her holding hands with Ann, her giving a speech to a small group of college club presidents like it would save the world, her in his arms. He sighed, a long breath in his nose and out of his mouth. He nodded.

He flicked his eyes up to her, just in time to see a single tear roll down her cheek. He fought the impulse to wipe it away and watched her do it instead. He watched her breathe, watched her stand up straight and pull down on her costume, wiping under her eyes. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, his voice laced with shame.

“Me too, Benji, me too.”

His eyes widened at the sound of his childhood name, his mayoral name. He never told Shauna about Partridge, about Ice Town, about anything before college. She never asked, he never divulged. Shauna knew him, Shauna knew everything about him, and she liked him anyway. 

“Fuck,” he breathed. “Shauna.” He reached for her and she took another step back.

“Don’t touch me.” Her words cut through him. “Don’t talk to me. Don’t come to the lab, don’t find me.” She looked to the sky and controlled her breathing, swallowing her tears. She looked to the ground. “Goodbye, Ben.” She turned around and took a couple steps before she stopped, turning her head, her eyes still on the ground. “If it wasn’t clear, we’re done.”

And she walked off. Past the house, back to campus, until he couldn’t see her anymore. 

Ben couldn’t feel his limbs but somehow he started walking. He didn’t feel the pavement or the movement in his legs or his swinging arms. His shoulder hit people who were laughing with friends on the sidewalk and they glared at him and called him names but he just kept walking. Nothing was coming to his mind and nothing was registering in his touch, in his stride, in his movements. So he just walked. 

His disgust at himself rose from the pit of his stomach and when he reached the middle of the quad he bent over and puked. His muscles clenched and his throat felt raw as he threw up over the stones of people who donated to the school, their names covered in his regret. He stood up and felt the earth move below him. He closed his eyes and tried to keep from falling.

“Ben!”

Ben squeezed his eyes shut, blocking out his name. But it was called again. And again. Finally, he turned and blinked lazily, the world coming into focus very slowly.

Andy, dressed like Hulk Hogan, stood with a trash bag in his hand, hiding behind a tree. Andy waved for him to come and Ben somehow found the strength and balance to walk up to him.

“Hey man, are you okay? I saw you puke, it was super gross.” Andy smiled, his face clenching.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” Ben rubbed his face and tried to push down another episode.

“You know, Ben, I’m not an idiot.” Andy tapped his head. “I know things. I am going to guess that you are not fine.”

Ben rolled his eyes and leaned against the tree. “Sure.”

“It’s girl trouble, isn’t it?” Andy asked, leaning next to Ben. Ben thumped his head against the bark and groaned. “One time, April didn’t like me but now she totally does. I could help you become the Ramero you want to be.”

“Do you mean Romeo?”

“Ramero, the guy who talks funny but also carries a sword.”

“Romeo.”

“The point is, Ben, I--”

“Andy, thank you, but I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Hey,” Andy started. Ben looked up. Andy’s body softened and his puppy dog blue eyes, lined in eyeliner and underneath bleached eyebrows, were light with concern. “You can tell me, man, we’re friends.”

They were hardly friends. Andy once came barreling into the ASC while Ben was tutoring Leslie, frantic over lost keys to his dorm. He lost them so many times, housing said they would stop giving him more spares. Leslie gripped his arm and handed him a key from her pocket, as if she always had one for him, just in case. Other than that whirlwind encounter and the one where they actually met, they hadn’t really talked. But, the way Andy looked at Ben, and the sudden change in his voice made Ben believe him. And Ben didn’t really have any friends, so who was he to deny one?

“When you’re ready,” Andy said. He threw the garbage bag over his shoulder and motioned for Ben to follow him. And for some reason, Ben did.

They walked through campus, behind tress, Andy doing shoulder rolls when the moment felt right. Ben scanned the area for whatever Andy was sneaking away from but only found costumed students who were busy with their own conversations or outings. Andy stopped in a small patch of grass near the library, a few large trees circling the area. The ground crunched under his feet, dead leaves scattering the damp grass. Andy stopped and plopped the bag down. He bent over and dug threw it, pulling out two toilet paper rolls. He smiled and tossed one to Ben who caught it in surprise.

“What are you doing?” Ben asked.

“ _We_ ” - Andy smiled - “are having fun.”

Andy unrolled the toilet paper a couple feet and then threw it high into the air, toward a tree. Ben watched it unravel and fly over the tree, draping it with a white stripe as the empty tube bounced and rolled across the grass. Andy bent down to get another and Ben just gripped his, unable to move.

“Andy, we can’t do this.” 

“Ben,” Andy mocked, “we can do this. It’s harmless, and it’s fun. Try it!” 

Andy shot another one in the air and Ben watched it fall in a perfect ribbon over the branches. He looked back at his own roll, now bent from his grip. He pushed it to create its original shape and slowly unrolled it a few feet. Why shouldn’t he just make this night worse? Put on a Peter Pan costume, be dumped, and feel like a complete asshole. Of course vandalizing the campus was the next logical step.

Ben pushed his hand back and remembered the time he threw the last out in a tied baseball game his junior year of high school and let the roll go, his stupid hat flying off his head. It flew in a satisfying wave, covering a tree and fell to the ground. Andy cheered. It felt good.

Ben walked over to the bag and pulled out another toilet paper roll. He saw eggs and shaving cream in the bag and found himself excited to move on to other tools. He unraveled the roll and threw it, landing on the top of the roof of the library. Ben smiled, letting the endorphins hide everything, to take over. He grabbed another and ran to a bare tree while Andy grabbed a shaving cream can and moved to the wall of the library.

“I like Leslie,” Ben said, letting go of the roll. His words echoed in his throat as he watched the toilet paper fly. 

“Woah dude.” Andy stopped in the middle of a word that Ben could decipher to be POOP and turned around. “Nice, Leslie is super cool. Full disclosure, because you’re my friend, I did try to sleep with her freshman year but she kicked me right in the balls.” Andy turned back, making another O. “We’ve been friends ever since.”

Ben smiled, reaching into the bag for the egg carton. He angled his body to face the one huge window in the front of the library. He put the carton, open, next to his feet and faced forward. He always wanted to be a pitcher but he just didn’t throw as hard as everyone else. 

“But wait, what about Shauna?” 

At the mention of her name, Ben felt his chest twist. He picked up his leg, pulled back and threw, yelling as he let go of the egg. He watched it smash against the window, yolk running down the glass. He breathed, deep and satisfied, and picked up another one.

“I fucked that up.” Ben threw again.

“Because you like Leslie.”

Ben rolled his shoulders as he held a new egg. Andy finished writing in shaving cream and walked over to him, grabbing two eggs in his hand. He threw with no hesitation, no plan. Ben nodded and the two threw in silence until the carton was empty. Andy grabbed another and plopped it between them and they started again.

“Hey!”

Andy whirled around and gasped. “5-0! 5-0!” He ran toward a line of bushes, jumping over them, his limbs flailing. 

Ben crushed the egg in his hand and the yolk dripped through his fingers. With his free hand he grabbed his hat and put it on his head for some reason.

Cops. 

Ben was deathly afraid of cops. His dad used to threaten him with cops to “take him away to jail” when he would pull his sister’s hair or steal Henry’s toys. Ben knew better now, of course, he knew you couldn’t go to jail for such minor offenses. But he could go for this, and he was still deathly afraid of jail.

“I have no drugs!” Ben yelled. A flashlight blinded him.

“Put your hands where I can see them.” 

Ben opened his mouth to get more air, his breaths short and shallow. He slowly raised his hands, the shell falling down his front, leaving a trail of slimy yolk. He heard the cop slowly walk up to him, the sound of his shoes in the grass like a death march.

He lowered the light to Ben’s chest and Ben could see him. He was the same height as Ben, not even much older, and not a cop, but a campus security officer. No guns, but still scary. His name tag said D. Sanderson.

“What are you doing?”

Ben swallowed. “Not smoking pot.”

Sanderson clicked off his flashlight and slinked it in its holster. “Do you have drugs?”

“No, I really don’t.” Ben shook his head.

“That was the second time you mentioned drugs, I think I can safely assume you have drugs.”

“I don’t have any drugs.”

Sanderson patted him down anyway, crushing and removing leaves as he went. He zip tied Ben’s hands together and walked him to the golf cart. He sat in the passenger seat, the cold air whipping across his face. Ice Clown strikes again.

The campus security office was in the back of the administration building, just a small room with steel folding chairs and a small desk with a computer. Sanderson motioned for Ben to sit. Ben rubbed his wrists together as he heard Sanderson make a phone call, rummage through papers, and scribble Ben’s information onto a form. Ben told him his name and where he lived and Sanderson filled in the rest. The zip tie snagged Ben’s tights, creating a huge hole on his thigh. 

He waited, not sure for what, or for who. He didn’t want to talk to Sanderson, he didn’t want to know what was going to happen to him. He listened to the faint tick of the clock on the wall and pulled more leaves off of him and watched them fall to the ground until there weren’t any more. Ben smashed one with his foot and then another before Sanderson told him to cut it out.

A knock on the door startled them both. They shared a look and Ben tried to get his breathing under control, to slow his heart. His palms started to sweat against each other. Sanderson got up and rounded the desk, opening the door. 

But it wasn’t a Bloomington police officer or the grim reaper himself. It was Leslie. Her hair was whipped back and she immediately dropped her flashlight, magnifying glass, and book on the desk as she walked in. She caught Ben’s gaze and they locked eyes while she caught her breath. He was thankful to see her and it made his whole body buzz with guilt.

“Leslie,” Sanderson said. Leslie’s eyes raked Ben’s body, no doubt taking in his damaged and disgusting costume. He adjusted his hat, and tried to cross his arms to block his body from her. She turned around and Ben felt the sad clot in his throat tighten.

“Dave, please.” 

Dave sighed and put his hands on his hips. “He was vandalizing the library.”

“That’s the best place to vandalize!” She yelled, her hands shooting to the air before falling to her sides. Ben kept his head down. “Dave, please, let him go. I will clean up the library.” Dave just kept looking at her, strong and unmoving. 

“I can’t Leslie. He was suspicious. On numerous occasions he alluded to having narcotics. And to be quite honest, he’s dressed like a weirdo.” 

“It’s Halloween! Dave, please.” Ben caught her body shift, her hip popping and shoulders drooping and he imagined she was pouting. Like when she negotiated L’il Sebastian when Ben couldn’t justify the cost for a pony at a dance.

“Fine,” Dave sighed. He rubbed his forehead and walked behind the desk and grabbed a pair of scissors. “But you’re not cleaning it up.” He pointed at Leslie before ducking behind the desk and plopping cleaning supplies on the surface. “He is.”

Leslie stood tall. “It’s already being taken care of.”

Dave cut Ben’s zip tie and Ben rubbed his wrists, standing slowly. Leslie thanked Dave and kissed him on the cheek and Ben watched Dave’s skin match the color of his hair. He walked out of the office and followed Leslie toward the patch of grass he was taken from. 

“Ben,” Leslie started. He stopped.

“Thank you, Leslie. I will clean it up.”

“No, I--”

“I got it, Leslie.”

“Ben!” She stomped her foot and he stopped, turning to her. “I’m sorry about Shauna.”

“Don’t be,” he said.

“It’s all my fault.”

“No it’s not.”

“I talked to her. I told her nothing happened between us that night.” Leslie pleaded, taking a few steps toward him. He backed up until she stopped. “But she didn’t know it was just us.”

Ben looked down. He was covered in egg and there were holes in his tights. “No, she didn’t.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.” He looked back up, and her eyes, glowing in the dull light of a campus safety light, were soft and pleading. Full of so much regret, so much sadness that she didn’t deserve. Anything he cared about he dragged through the mud tonight. “It’s mine.”

Leslie opened her mouth to speak but closed it again. She gripped her flashlight in both of her hands, the magnifying glass sticking between two fingers. He swallowed her, took in the glow of her hair, the light of her eyes, her pale, smooth skin. Shauna didn’t deserve him, and Leslie sure as hell didn’t either.

“You forgot your book,” he said. She looked down and back up at him, biting her lip.

Ben gave her a small, sad smile before he turned around and started toward his mess.


	6. Chapter 6

There was something very calming about laying track and unwrapping new freight cars to attach to his Standard DC Central Pacific Jupiter steam engine. Ben adjusted the cap on his head and looked at the wheels of each car he unwrapped. These cars were just as pristine as the guy at the store said they were. He placed them on the track and then connected them. He stood and admired his work, wishing he had the room to set up a whole town, a whole station. Maybe when he graduated and moved off campus Ben could set up a whole room with multiple miniature towns that had connecting tracks and he could paint the citizens of the town and strategically place bushes and trees. Ben smiled and bounced on his toes.

He really could accomplish a lot if he just put his mind to it.

Ben glanced at the clock and his eyes widened. He grabbed his backpack and out of his room, down the hallway and across campus to his stupid philosophy class. That he hadn’t done the reading for in two weeks. Or any homework. He would feel bad, but he was still high off what he accomplished that morning.

He sat in his usual back row desk. His professor droned on and Ben kept doodling trains and bushes in the margins of his notebook paper. Then some one turned around and passed him a packet of paper. 

A test, apparently. 

Ben’s heart pumped in his ears, loud and painful. He felt the sinking feeling that he had after that stressful dream where he showed up to his mayoral inauguration naked. He quickly raised his hand.

“No questions please, the test has begun,” his professor said. 

“We have a test today?” Ben squeaked. 

A few students looked back at him while the professor kept his attention on his own desk. Ben looked around the room, everyone’s attention slowly turning back to their tests. The text on the page blurred as he looked it over. He didn’t even know what they were studying, let alone able to answer questions about whoever the fuck Francis Bacon was. He pushed his hand through his hair and felt his hat. He grabbed it and took it off, quickly pushing it under his seat. He ran to class in a stupid conductor’s hat. He enveloped his face in his hands and groaned, rubbing circles into his forehead. 

An hour later, the tests were collected and Ben sat in his desk as the professor packed up his belongings and walked out. Ben kept his head down, placing his cap back on his head. The classroom buzzed with silence and it was maddening and scary but he didn’t want to get up. The door creaked open and Ben squeezed his eyes shut. He took a breath and slowly picked up his head. A flash of black passed him and then sat down in the desk next to him. He turned and focused his eyes on Leslie.

Her hair was pulled back and a black bandana was tied around her pony tail. She faced forward and her hands were delicately laying on her notebook. He silently begged for her to look at him but also wished she wouldn’t. Her notebook paper was clean except for where she wrote “Humanities 302 Notes - November 15, 1995”. She wrote out the month as if she wouldn’t understand what Nov or 11 meant. 

And it drove him crazy.

He swallowed and took the hat off his head. He grabbed his backpack and slung it over his shoulder, keeping his eyes on her, trying to etch her into his memory. This beautiful, wonderful girl who he hadn’t heard laugh in two weeks. The girl who kept popping into his dreams. The girl that kept flooding his mind while he should be mourning the loss of Shauna. The guilt would wake him up at night, a growing gnawing punch twisting in his stomach. He rolled out of bed and arranged his trains, rearrange their order or just sit among them. He also started his own comic book, The Adventures of Star Boy. Star Boy had the ability to read the stars, which he interpreted into colossal future disasters that he tried to stop. So far, Ben thought, the story was solid but his drawings were coming out terribly. 

He wanted to tell Leslie all of this. To beg her to wrap her arms around him and tell him to snap out of it. But that was his business to tend to, Leslie was not the handy woman of his life. She didn’t need to pick up the pieces and put him back together. It was tempting to let her do it, and God knows she would, and probably host a Get Ben’s Life Back Rally.

Leslie finally turned to him and her eyes were so light, even in the dull fluorescent glow of the classroom. 

“You haven’t shaved.”

“No reason to.”

She gave him a small smile. “I miss you.”

Ben closed his eyes and clenched his fingers into fists. He turned and walked down the aisle as a few more students filed in. He turned around at the top of the row. 

“How’s the ball coming?” he asked.

“We got more than we needed. Li’l Sebastian is coming.” Leslie beamed at him, her proud smile lighting up her entire face. Ben found himself smiling back and she blinked away, smoothing her hand down her notebook, watching it as it went across the page. Her bangs fell in her eye and he wanted to leap over the desks to push them away.

He needed the trains.

“You did it,” he said.

“We did it.” She stood up, grabbed her things, and walked down the aisle and his heart raced. She settled into a front row desk and Ben took a shaky, calming breath. He could push her bangs away, he could reach her. “You’re not as big of a disaster as you think you are.”

He wanted to laugh but the soft heat at her words took over instead. Leslie tapped the end of her pen on the desk and her smile grew. He looked away and grabbed the doorknob. 

“I miss you, too.”

He imagined she smiled when he left, so he spent the rest of the day trying to draw Star Boy until he forgot about her hypothetical smile.

//

It took Chris three weeks to say something. Chris was packing a small bag for the Thanksgiving break while Ben was filling in dialogue for Star Boy’s latest adventure. 

“And then he says ‘The only constellations I see are the ones that no one else can’.” Chilling, isn’t it?” Ben beamed up at Chris.

Chris tilted his head. Ben turned back to his comic, filling in more awesome dialogue. He turned a page to check his sketches of Star Boy’s costume before Chris spoke.

“I think you’re depressed.” Chris sounded sadder than usual and it startled Ben more than the accusation itself. 

Ben shook his head and grabbed his paper. “I’m the farthest thing from depressed.” He showed Chris his masterpiece. “Look at this.”

Chris grabbed the paper and looked it over. He smiled sadly before handing it back to Ben. 

“That’s three panels.”

“It’s a whole adventure!”

“Ben.”

Ben looked back down at the paper. He felt his blood push through his body and sweat leak down his forehead. Chris was right. It was only three panels. How had Ben come up with an entire comic book’s worth of story and only had three panels worth of it? Star Boy standing by himself, Star Boy looking at stars, and an unfinished panel of a zoom in on the stars and two pieces of dialogue. But, he had worked on this for weeks. Sure, he had to redraw and redraw Star Boy until he looked perfect, but still. This was supposed to be his excuse for that F on his philosophy test, for his declining grade in poli-sci.

“Oh God.” 

Ben glanced around the room, at his trains, so many trains, so much track. The track went around Chris’s free weights and under their bunk bed and jotted out again toward the desk. When did he buy so many trains? How much money had he spent? He had a good amount of money in his bank account but most of it was for books for next semester.

“Oh God,” Ben said again.

“Now, calm down--”

“No! I spent three weeks on this! How is it only three panels?” Ben stood up. “I told Stephanie it was just as good as Batman, Chris!” He put his hands on his hips and surveyed his train set. “I’m pretty sure I spent all of next semester’s book money on the trains.”

He sat down on his bed and hit the top of his head on the top bunk. Chris sat down next to him and put a hand on his shoulder while Ben held his head in his hands, his fingers rubbing the budding bruise. Ben tried to control his own breathing while Chris just squeezed his shoulder. 

“I know this is about your recent breakup with journalism major and outstanding person Shauna Malwae-Tweep,” Chris said. Ben groaned. “There’s plenty of lovely women here. Just the other day I met a beautiful girl named Ann Perkins!” Ben groaned again. “She was very drunk, but a very good kisser.”

Ben rubbed his eyes, trying to block out the image of Chris making out with Ann. The thought of Ann led to the thought of Leslie and how much Ben wanted to make out with her. He curled his fingers into his hair and pulled.

“Now, come on. We can share a cab to the airport.” 

Right, he had to go home. His life couldn’t get any worse.

//

“What the hell happened to your face?” 

Stephanie popped a bubble, the pink gum snapping back onto her face. She picked at the sticky mess until she got it back into her mouth. Ben cringed and leaned over to let his mother kiss his cheek. He settled back into his seat as the car pulled away from the curb.

“If you think people wont recognize you because you have some ugly beard, you are mistaken.” Stephanie pulled her bright yellow headphones back over her ears.

Ben sighed and leaned back in his seat. His mother asked him the usual round of questions, and there were a lot of snide comments about not hearing from him in weeks. As soon as she mentioned how his father would be arriving tomorrow morning, he heard Stephanie’s music become louder, a static blasting from her headphones.

“I hope we have a high chair for his girlfriend,” his mother said, gripping the steering wheel.

He tried to keep his attention on the snow lining the highway. The terrible thing about coming home was not only his broken, passive aggressive family, but the citizens of the town he collapsed. From what he understood, Partridge was still bankrupt and still at a 25% unemployment rate. That made a lot of broke people who had nothing else to do but taunt him and vandalize his bedroom window. 

The spray paint on his window only said “Get out of town Ice Clown” but it was enough to make him just lay in his bedroom, cover his face with his blanket and fall asleep.

When Ben woke up, it was dark. He blinked, trying to adjust to the darkness. His room was just as he left it, a slight mess from his last day of summer when he frantically tried to find his stack of CD’s. His walls were still decorated with Star Wars posters and his desk was cluttered with awards and trophies from before he lost all pride in himself. In the darkness he couldn’t see the vandalism and in the darkness he could pretend he was 17 and just the student body treasurer and not a failed teenage mayor. A twinge of guilt rushed through Ben as he thought of Shauna and how she never outed him, how she knew everything about his life before IU. Shauna didn’t even let him know that she knew, she didn’t tell anyone, she didn’t write a front page article about the failed mayor that roamed their campus. Really, he deserved more than just one slap in the face.

Ben pushed back the covers and rubbed his fingers through his beard. It felt itchy and hot but the effort to get rid of it wasn’t worth it. His eyes had finally adjusted and when he looked up to the ceiling, Princess Leia stared back down at him. He tacked that poster up when he turned 13, after his friend Jack told him he should move it up there. Jack was kind of a pervert, but he was also kind of an innovator.

If Ben could just shut out the world and pretend he was a 17 year old high school student who hadn’t ruined his life by becoming mayor of Partridge, Minnesota, then he might as well just embrace it.

He unzipped his pants and sighed. No roommate, no distractions, and just as self deprecating and lonely as he felt four years ago. His hand loosely gripped around his dick and he slowly pumped, focusing his eyes over Leia’s body. Her tan, long legs made him think of Shauna and he groaned and tried to push her out. This was about Leia who liked the bad guy because of his heart of gold. And had nice breasts. His hand moved faster as he let out a shaky breath. He tried to imagine Leia’s touch, soft or hard, rushed or slow, but he couldn’t get it right. He widened his eyes as if it would help him take her in, devour her perfect body and sexy costume. The light in the picture hit the side of her face, cascaded over her hair, turning part of her locks into a golden glow that reminded him of Leslie.

Leslie. He imagined her enveloped in him. He could smell the dust from the wooden floor and the dull scent of coffee grounds from below. Her hand was along his neck while the other was around his waist. He closed his eyes, blocked out the world and pulled her in. Ben’s fist moved faster and his free hand gripped the comforter and he balled the fabric in his hand. He felt her breath on his skin, her hips moving against his leg. He thrusted, as if trying to meet her movements, and his hand moved faster and faster. He turned his head and whimpered into the pillow. He knew how she felt, how her fingers moved on his skin. His stomach burned at the memory of her touch.

He heard his name on her lips and tried to manipulate it into a huskier whisper, slick with want and desire and how she would say it if he was touching her, on top of her, underneath her. Ben moaned and inhaled through his teeth, a strong hiss filling the air. He let go of the comforter and reached behind his head and grabbed the pillow and imagined she was there, that her hand was over his as she rode him. The cold heat started in his thighs and pulsed into his balls and up his cock. He started whimpering again, her name spilling out of his mouth and into the plaid pillow case. 

Leslie didn’t wear a lot of skirts, but she was in his mind, a short plaid skirt that was still around her waist as she rode him. Even in his fantasy, there wasn’t enough time to get her clothes off, only a moment to push up her skirt and move her panties to the side so he could push into her.

“Fuck,” he whispered.

Ben clenched his eyes shut and remembered the shape of her thighs, the feel of her body against his, the shape of her breasts on his stomach. He tried to imagine her perfect lips, the ones that pouted at him when he was being too strict about the budget or when she wanted to throw her calc homework in the trash. He imagined those lips on his, on his chest, over his stomach, on his cock. His thumb pushed against his tip, like he pictured Leslie’s tongue would. He yelped her name, in a squeaky, stuttering mess and felt himself rise. His hips bucked off the mattress, meeting his hand with each stroke. He squeezed and moved faster, letting the moans trickle out of his mouth.

A loud thump on his door made him yelp. He came into his palm as he watched the door open. He grabbed the blanket and pulled it up to his chin, trying to regain his breathing and not touch any other part of his body with his right hand. 

Two shadows, mangled together, bumped into his desk and a few trophies knocking over. Ben tried to speak but his throat felt tight and raw. He squinted and finally made out the outline of his older brother, whose pants just were pushed down his body.

“Henry!” Ben yelled. 

“What?” Henry pulled up his pants and hit the light switch. Ben tightened the blanket around his chin. 

“Oh my God, is that Benji Wyatt?” The girl asked. 

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Henry!” Ben said.

“Ew, is he your brother or something?” The girl popped her hip to the side while Henry buttoned his pants.

“Yes, but, I am not him! I didn’t bankrupt the town.” Henry pleaded. He grabbed the girls waist and tried to pull her back into him but she pushed and walked out of the room.

“Thanks a lot, Ice Clown.” Henry sighed and slammed the door behind him. 

Ben heard his brother pleading with the girl down the hallway, in the kitchen, and eventually from his bedroom window as she slammed her car door and sped off. He quickly reached for a tissue from his bedside table and cringed while he wiped off his hand. He quickly balled the tissues and threw them into the garbage can under his desk and zipped up his pants before crawling back into bed, just in time for Henry to walk back in.

“Thanks a lot,” Henry repeated.

“This is my room.”

“Well it used to be _our_ room. And unlike some of us, I need a place to bring women,” Henry explained.

“So?”

“So you should sleep on the couch or whatever failed mayors do.”

“Fine.”

Ben sighed and grabbed his pillow and the blanket and walked out of the room. Henry slammed the door as Ben rounded the corner to the living room. In high school, Henry was on the football team and dated every girl on the cheer squad but he was nice to Ben and even beat up Steve Russo after he called Ben a nerd. But now, Henry was a certified asshole. He hardly talked to Ben since he was impeached and when they had to gather for holidays or other family events, Henry was cold and mean. 

The grandfather clock ticked. Ben fell onto the couch and turned into the cushions, putting his pillow in his arms. If he was pathetic enough to masturbate to Leslie, he was pathetic enough to grip his pillow and pretend it was her.

//

Stephanie and Ben watched Empire Strikes Back while everyone busied themselves around the kitchen. Stephanie was never really a cook and since she was now 15, helping her family do anything was not a very popular choice. Ben was just tired of listening to his parents fight while trying to make small talk with his dad’s girlfriend, who Ben was sure was Henry’s age. So instead they watched Luke run around with Yoda on his back and talked about the intricacies of the Force and how it could be real.

“I’m surprised mom didn’t make you shave,” Stephanie said, putting her feet on the coffee table.

“She said something about how no one in this family knows how to look presentable and probably something about how I shame the family.”

“She wouldn’t say all that.”

“Ah, but it was the real meaning behind ‘please get down the roasting pan’.” 

They laughed as the credits rolled. Ben pushed off the couch and went to find Return of the Jedi to round out their movie marathon. He put in the movie and they watched in silence, the assortment of profanities and insults slinging behind them. Ben turned up the TV and stayed, even as Stephanie left to snack on olives. He could hear Henry set the table and the dread of dinner loomed closer and closer.

His mother called him to dinner three times before he actually got up. Everyone was putting down their drinks and claiming their seats and left Ben with the coveted chair between his father and his mother. Henry was at the head of the table, opposite their father and his dad’s new girlfriend, Mary Jane, was sitting across from Ben. 

Ben ate only what was passed to him. He kept his eyes down while Stephanie talked about the New Kids on the Block concert she went to a month ago and Henry was asked questions about his new job. The ticking time bomb to the explosion of yelling and the possibility of thrown food was fast approaching. Ben was just hoping he wouldn’t be dragged into it this year.

“Benji is dating a lovely girl who works for the school paper, right hun?” Fuck.

“Actually, mom--”

“You might know her, Mary Jane, you two are around the same age,” his mother flashed her annoyed, fake smile that was reserved for any jab at her ex husband or a bad report card.

“Oh, I--”

“Mom,” Ben started, “Shauna broke up with me.”

“That’s why you have that stupid beard,” Stephanie cackled.

“I shouldn’t be surprised, you are your father’s son,” his mom waved her hand at him. 

“I don’t even like winter sports,” his dad said.

Ben looked back down and pushed his green bean casserole around. His mashed potatoes looked fluffier than usual and he wondered if Mary Jane made them. He took a breath and then piled a fork full of potatoes in his mouth. 

“But you do like to date 20 year old women.” His mom kept her eyes on her plate, pushing around food with no intention of eating it.

Ben took another huge bite of potatoes and kept going as his parents started to go back and forth while Mary Jane quietly tried to prove she wasn’t 20, but 25. They kept yelling and Ben kept shoveling food into his mouth. At some point Stephanie threw her empty glass across the table and walked out and Ben grabbed the serving bowl of roasted carrots and continued eating. Henry ran after Stephanie and Mary Jane walked back in the kitchen, finally crying over the insults Ben’s mother kept slinging.

“Julia, why don’t you lower your voice, you’ve hurt Mary Jane’s feelings.” His dad rubbed his forehead but he didn’t look tired, he didn’t look like he had been going back and forth with his ex wife all day.

“This is my house--”

“Our house.”

“It’s the least you could give me after the terror you put me through.”

“I put you through?” His father’s voice was always low and gravely but it was reaching a new volume that meant things were about to become even worse, so Ben moved on to the dinner rolls. “What about the shit you put me through?”

Ben tore a piece bread with his front teeth and violently chewed. 

“Having a lovely wife must have been hell.”

“It wasn’t. For the first year.” 

Ben ran out of rolls and everything else was eaten or on some one else’s abandoned plate. He wasn’t sure if he tore through the food himself or if he never noticed how much the others had eaten. He wrung his hands together while his Thanksgiving meal turned over in his stomach. His stomach squeezed the food and it pushed back up but he swallowed it down and then the whole process started over again. His parents’ voices echoed in his ears. Asshole, wasted life, regret, jerk, divorce, go to hell, pain in the ass. 

“Enough!” Ben hit the table with his hands and the pulsing sting reminded him of his meeting with Chad the Freshman.

His parents stopped, his dad leaning over his plate and his mom leaning back in her chair. His dad’s eyes slowly shifted to Ben and the food was starting to move up Ben’s body. He pushed it down again and took a huge breath before he continued. 

“Do you see that everyone is gone? Do you see how you drive everyone away, including your own children?” He might have been screaming. “Just suck up your terrible decision to get married and your awful, probably selfish decision to have children, and shut the fuck up.” 

“Benji--”

“Suck it up, mom. You married a guy who wasn’t your God damned soul mate and it didn’t work out. You have three pretty okay children, who aren’t on drugs and aren’t dead so I would say you can be thankful for that. Fuck how dad wasn’t good for you and don’t dwell on it.” Ben turned to his father. “And keep filling the void of loneliness with women half your age just so you can rub it in mom’s face so that she can never be happy.”

Ben coughed and felt his throat push and his food was slowly making its way back up. 

“Ben, watch your mouth.” His dad’s stern voice usually scared him but Ben was on a roll and his dinner was threatening come up any second now.

“Both of you just get over yourselves. You’re not bad people, you’re not terrible parents, you just weren’t the right two people to get married to each other. You weren’t the perfect pairing to raise children and you certainly weren’t meant to be.” Ben burped and the sweat started to roll down his neck. “It’s no one’s fucking fault that you two thought you were doing the right thing when the universe decided you weren’t.”

Ben caught his breath and held onto his stomach. Before he closed his eyes he saw his brother and sister slowly walk back into the room. His mind fogged over and his father’s voice, stern and slow, was muffled in his ear. He caught a few words like “language” and “how dare you” but overall it sounded like a growling mush. He tightened his eyes shut until he saw specks of green.

His own words blared in his head and his brain swelled and pulsed against his skull. The swirling, familiar feeling of guilt crept up his spine and pushed out to the rest of his body. Ben needed to stop yelling at everyone for his own problems. Chad the Freshman and his parents, while both worthy of his words, were not deserving of his outrage. He was the one deserving of his anger. He needed to listen to himself and stop trying to make everyone else listen.

“I’m so sorry,” Ben whimpered.

His gut wrenched into a small circle and then pushed and he leaned over the back of his chair and puked. His throat burned and he couldn’t breath as he bent over, his abdomen clenched tight. He coughed and spit and puked again and again. He felt dizzy and light but he heard his mom move and felt his dad grab his shoulders. The powerlessness of it all felt like his impeachment all over again. 

Ben curled into the couch and held onto his stomach. His mom put down a mop bucket next to his head and a wet cloth on his forehead. He mumbled a thank you and kept whimpering his apologies into the cushions. He didn’t know how long he sat there, how long he rocked himself and pleaded over and over that he was sorry before Stephanie gave him his pillow.

“Thanks,” he said.

He threw up again and Stephanie yelped, jumping back. 

“How much did you eat?” she asked, her hands up.

She lowered her arms slowly and took a step back. She watched him, her eyes boring into him like a question while he tried to regain normal breaths, to feel a normal temperature, to will himself to stop sweating. Ben’s eyes grew heavy and when he let them close, Stephanie spoke again. 

“You’ve really got to get rid of that beard.”


	7. Chapter 7

Ben looked at himself in the mirror. His shorts were a little too short which meant that he grew since high school which seemed ridiculous. The WYATT written on one leg was faded. He pulled on his tube socks and then smashed them back down toward the shoes he took from Henry’s room. He pulled on his Letters to Cleo t-shirt and jogged in place for a second. He could be a runner. He could be a runner for Chris.

Chris’s alarm buzzed. Chris stirred and turned off the clock and sat up, chipper and ready for the day like he was every morning. 

“Ben Wyatt?” Chris asked, his voice still holding a hint of sleep. “You are up early. Good for you!” Chris pointed at him.

“Yeah, well.” Ben tried to force a smile. “I thought I would finally take you up on your offer. Let’s go jogging.”

Chris lit up and hugged Ben. Ben hugged him back, the first hug he received since Shauna broke up with him. As usual, Chris held on for too long but this time Ben didn’t care. Chris pulled away and slapped Ben’s shoulder before changing into his own jogging gear, which looked way fancier than Ben’s, and Ben followed him out of their room. In the cold, Ben immediately regretted his shorts and t-shirt but Chris, who was wearing sweat pants and a sweatshirt, quickly told him the jog would warm him up.

“We should stretch first,” Chris noted. He pulled his foot up to his butt and Ben tried to do the same. Ben just copied whatever stretch Chris did, fumbling and stumbling over his own feet as he did. He hoped that he was stretching the right muscles. “I think we’re ready.” Chris had never looked so happy. It was too early to be that happy.

They jogged. They went through campus, out to the front entrance and down the road, Ben’s feet slipping periodically on the icy pavement. His chest felt like it was in a vise and his skin burned from the cold. Chris kept yelling encouragements at him when Ben started to slow. Chris never went ahead even though Ben knew he was holding him back. Ben stopped twice during the run and Chris jogged in place while Ben held on to his knees, bent over. He watched his breath form in violent puffs of fog. Every breath he took in felt like icy knives pushing down his throat and expanding in his lungs. They circled the entire campus, making a huge loop until they were back in the front entrance again. Ben sprinted across the campus, back to their dorm, Chris cheering the whole way. When they reached the building, Ben collapsed, rolling on the damp pavement, his hair pushing into a pile of snow that was shoveled to the side of the path.

“I’m dying,” Ben moaned.

“Ben Wyatt! You are a great runner!”

That was a lie, of course, but Ben smiled up at Chris anyway. Chris beamed down at him and gave him a double thumbs up. At least running with Chris had the effect Ben was going for: Chris was happy. 

“Sorry about the trains,” Ben moaned, rolling onto his chest. The cool sidewalk made him feel more alive and less like life was slowly leaving his body. 

“Don’t worry, Ben. You are my friend and I was just worried about you. Trains are actually magnificent!” Chris put a hand out and Ben took it, standing to his feet. He felt his blood rush all over his body as he walked with Chris into the building. 

Ben’s legs were wobbly and he wanted to go back to bed but he had stuff to do. He grabbed a change of clothes and his shower caddy and took a boiling hot shower. The dorm showers were a nightmare but they had something that his mother’s shower didn’t: magnificent water pressure. He stood under the stream and let it hit his muscles that roared from his run, and filled his lungs with steaming hot air as if defrosting them. The water washed away the sweat, the dirt from the ground, and everything else that was wrong with him. 

His jeans fell on his hips and Ben rolled his eyes. Of course he had lost weight. He was a fucking mess. He hung the towel around his neck and walked to the sink. Some guys from his floor walked in and out, the day finally starting for most of them. He kept his eyes down and forward as he arranged his shaving tools on the side of the sink. He ran the hot water on the tap and looked at himself.

The beard really was a disaster. He sighed and rubbed the shaving cream into the hair on his face, down to his neck. Shaving felt rough, but the slight sting was refreshing and the cool air on his cheeks was even better. When he was done he rinsed his face and actually grinned at his reflection. He brushed his teeth and put his plaid shirt over his shoulders and buttoned it before walking back to his dorm.

Ben grabbed the box holding all his cassettes and CDs and emptied it on the floor under his desk. The train tracks, train cars, and locomotives overflowed the box as he walked back across campus, straight into the student center and plopped it down in the middle of the reading room. Two girls watched him grab a piece of paper from the printer and pull a pen from his back pocket. Ben scribbled “FREE TRAINS” on it before folding the paper over the side of the box and walking back out into the cold.

He checked his watch and sighed. He pulled his jacket tighter around him and looked at his feet. He should just go, she was probably there, and he should just do it, quick like a Band-Aid. Ben jogged through the quad and past the library. He rounded the corner, taking the familiar journey to the small building. He pushed open the door and felt his heart beat in his ears. Two guys passed him in the hallway, giving him surprised stares. He shook them off and pushed open the door.

Shauna was at a computer, her eyes darting around the screen. She didn’t even look up when he walked in. A girl near the door did. She got up and stepped in front of him and pushed his shoulder.

“Get out.”

Ben put his hands up. “I just want to talk to Shauna.”

“She’s busy,” said the girl. 

Ben vaguely remembered her from the hours he spent in the lab. Kelly? Kim? Yeah, Kim. Her blonde hair was pulled back in a neon scrunchy and her lipgloss was sparkly, but she looked like she would punch Ben in the balls at any moment.

“Kim, I just--”

“It’s okay,” Shauna said, not looking up from the computer screen, “can you give us a minute?” Her eyes flicked to Kim and then back to the computer.

Kim scowled at him and pushed past him, knocking him into a table. He pushed off the wood and walked to Shauna. She looked the same, and he could smell her body wash wafting from her skin. His chest twisted in guilt. She typed something and then turned to him. She crossed her legs and sat back.

Ben suddenly didn’t know what to do with his hands.

“Uh, hi.” Ben waved, clearing his throat. 

“Hi.” 

Shauna crossed her arms but her face looked neutral. Not mad, not sad, not happy, just unreadable. He never felt like he couldn’t read her. Ben sighed and was suddenly glad he hadn’t eaten yet because his stomach wouldn’t stop stretching and turning. He ran his hands down his face and smoothed them behind his head and he hung onto the back of his neck.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispered.

The silence that followed ate at him. Her foot shook as she looked at him but her face didn’t change. The only sound in the room was the hum of the computers. He didn’t know what else to say, he really was sorry, sorry he was dishonest, sorry he fell for another girl while he was dating her, sorry that he chased those feelings and spent more time with said girl. Leslie. Sorry that he fucked Shauna because he felt guilty, sorry that he couldn’t man up and break up with her before things got bad. Thank God she dumped him before he was really stupid.

“You should have told me,” Shauna said. Her voice was calm and even, so fucking reasonable that he wanted to tell her to slap him again.

“Yes, I really should have.” Ben let his hands fall to his jeans. He looked down and took a breath. He flicked his eyes back to her. “I’m so sorry, Shauna.” 

“Thank you.” 

“Look,” Ben started. He grabbed a chair and sat down, leaning on his elbows on his knees. “I can’t make this up to you, but I want to try.” Shauna waited. “I want to give you a great cover story.” 

“I don’t need it, I already was made editor.” The way she said it, so casually, almost made Ben miss it. 

“Wait what?” he asked, his voice rising. She tried not to smile, he could see her biting it back. “Shauna, that’s amazing. You told me only seniors get editor.” She put her arms out like it wasn’t a big deal but Ben knew it was. It was a huge deal. “Congratulations.”

She finally smiled, her eyes shifting away from him to do so. “Thank you.”

Ben wanted to hug her but he knew he couldn’t, he shouldn’t. So he clasped his hands together instead. “I still want to give you the story.”

Shauna looked at him, as if trying to pull the story from him without words. Ben let her think about it, let her rake her eyes over him, cautious. That was fair. She finally broke her gaze and reached for a notepad on the desk and uncapped her pen before she said, “Okay.”

Ben sat back and took a deep breath before he spoke, his hands shaking.

“The student body should know about the failed teenage mayor that walks among them,” he said. Shauna’s eyebrow rose. “And I have a lot of insider information.”

//

Ben went back to the ASC the next day and tried to catch up on his reading while he waited for people who needed help. He looked over a midterm for one sophomore and did math homework with a freshman. After two hours, Ben’s vision was blurry from hastily reading pages and pages of his books. He rubbed his eyes and said goodbye to Jerry. Ben went to his dorm and shoved all of his books, notebooks, and binder into a large duffle bag. He grabbed his planner, empty and useless the whole semester, and shoved it in his back pocket. He threw the bag over his shoulder and waved to Chris, who was listening to music and practically highlighting his entire textbook.

The sun had already set and the yellow glow of the campus lights led his way toward Rossmor Hall. He sped up when he saw a few guys chatting in the lobby through the window. He knocked on the door, his breath fogging the window. One guy walked up to the door and opened it. 

“Thanks,” Ben said, pushing past him. 

He walked down the left hallway and looked for her door, reaching it in six long strides. He knocked.

“Come in!”

Ben turned the knob and when he saw her, it felt like a breath of fresh air. Leslie was sitting on her bed, smack in the middle of her blue sheets, her hair piled on her head. A binder was open on her legs that were covered in black tights. She was wearing polka dot socks and he could see her toes shifting as she looked at him. Her shirt said MINOR THREAT on the front in Sharpie and her short, plaid skirt fanned out around her. The urge to pick her up and kiss her was strong so he gripped the doorknob.

“Ben,” she breathed, “hi.”

“Hey,” he smiled. She returned his grin and the way her eyes looked at him was enough to make him forget why he came here. 

“Come in, sorry it’s a mess.” 

Ben shook his head and walked in, closing the door behind him. It wasn’t as messy as it was the first time he came here. Her model of the student center was on her desk and the other party supplies and samples were in a somewhat organized pile by Ann’s bed. A few binders were lined up against the bed frame. One binder was titled POSSIBLE DISASTERS. On her bed, in a beautiful mess, were many of her textbooks as if she was studying for every class at once.

“What’s in the bag?” Leslie asked, pointing her pencil at him.

“Oh, right.” He dropped the bag on the floor and immediately felt the relief in his arm. “Feel free to say no,” he started, opening the bag, “but I, uh, well, I hit a rough patch.” 

“How are you doing?” The change in her voice, lower and full of something that sounded like guilt made him stop. He wanted to tell her not to worry but he knew she’d do it anyway.

“I’m fine, but, my grades are terrible.” He grabbed a couple of his text books and a notebook and stood up. “I need your help.”

A smile slowly crept onto her face, holding firm as it reached her eyes. She tilted her head and closed her binder, shoving it to the side. “Okay.”

Ben’s shoulders relaxed. “Okay.”

Leslie looked through his notebook and took tests out of the sleeves of his binder. Her eyes widened at the D’s and F’s on his papers, on his philosophy paper that was only a page long. He kept his gaze on his clasped hands. He listened to her ruffle through his work and multiple syllabuses. When he flicked his eyes to her, she was biting her lip, her brow furrowed as she looked over his philosophy syllabus. He wasn’t sure how long he sat next to her on her bed, her knee bumping his hip when she reached for something else, brushing her bangs back when she looked down at papers. 

“You need to get an A on your philosophy final,” she said, her eyes following her pen on a clean piece of lined paper. He nodded. “Econ is also a mess but you can pass with a C on your final so that is your lowest priority.” 

Ben nodded again. She listed off what he needed to do and how many hours he needed to dedicate to catching up on his reading. Leslie pulled out a clean binder and put the schedule she created in the cover sleeve. The title read BEN’S ONLY HOPE. She nudged him, mumbling about Star Wars, and he let his body linger into hers and she accepted the added weight. He put his arm behind her and the feeling of her head resting on his shoulder made his throat tighten and Ben didn’t want to know of a world where the air didn’t smell like faint vanilla and Sharpie.

She adjusted under him, grabbing his work and organizing it into some order and started putting them into the binder. He watched her, edging off of her body so she could move freely. The cool air that replaced her warmth clawed at him but he gave her space, letting her work. He shouldn’t be rushing anything anyway, he may be a single man, but he was still a man teetering on the edge of another mental breakdown. Leslie didn’t need that.

“How’s the ball?” he asked.

She didn’t look up or stop as she spoke. “Things are going well. Li’l Sebastian is coming.”

“What is a pony going to do at a dance?”

Leslie’s mouth tightened and she gripped her pen before slamming the binder shut. “He’s a mini horse!”

She whipped her head to him and her pony tail flew behind her. Her eyes were flared as she looked at him. He leaned back and put up his hands but his mouth was curving into a smile on it’s own. Leslie’s eyes traced his lips and her mouth dropped open.

“It’s not a joke, he is a treasure.” 

“Okay.” Oh God, he really shouldn’t be laughing.

Leslie grabbed the binder she just made him and smacked him in the arm with it. He kept laughing and she kept hitting him, the cardboard and plastic hardly hurting but the thought of her resorting to violence over a pony kept him laughing. He put his arms up and she threw the binder down. He heard some papers crumple as it hit the floor. Leslie grabbed his arms and turned his body, pinning him down on her bed. He wondered if he was really weak or if she was really strong.

“Say you love Li’l Sebastian.” The giggles that littered her words made his stomach tighten.

“Never!” He mocked in some kind of accent. Southern? British? 

His sides began to hurt from laughing but she was crawling over his body and he was starting to forget what they were playfully fighting about. She poked at his sides and his armpits and he squirmed under her, his laugh pulling him from the intense knowledge that she was straddling his crotch and that her weight on him made his insides warm. He grabbed her waist and tried to pull her off of him but her legs gripped him. Ben tried to tickle her sides but she only giggled, her legs still holding firm. Her whole face lit up, her eyes squinting and her smile huge. Her cackles filled the room and echoed in his ears. He watched her take a few calming breaths and her glossed eyes focused on him. 

He didn’t know he had stopped tickling her until her eyes fell to her waist. His hands were still, wrapped around her hips. His thumb was moving against the fabric of her skirt and it wasn’t until he saw it move that he registered he was actually doing it. He felt the slight shift of her body and the rough material of her skirt. He smoothed his right hand down her thigh and wrapped his fingers around her leg above her knee. His left hand trailed around her waist, to the small of her back and he pushed. She fell forward, catching herself on her hands over his head. He was sure he stopped breathing but she took in a long breath and it made her hips move against his.

“Ben,” she whispered.

Her bangs fell onto his face and he saw the pink sneak onto her cheeks. He pushed her bangs away and held onto her head.

The door clicked open and Leslie’s body stiffened. When Ann started talking, Leslie quickly jumped off of Ben, waving away Ann’s apologies.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t know that--”

“It’s fine, Ann, you’re beautiful, the world is beautiful, we are fine, everything is fine.” Leslie straightened her skirt down her thighs. 

“I can go, I just--”

“No, Ann, stay!” Leslie beamed. “Ben isn’t doing well in his classes so I’m helping him get ready for finals.” Leslie scrambled for Ben’s binder and held it up.

“I see,” Ann said, shifting her gaze to Ben before looking back to Leslie. 

“Yuppy, yep, yes.” Ben stood up and gathered his things, shoving them back into his bag. “But you girls, ladies, um... equality partners, can have fun. I should get to work.” Ben pointed to his binder for emphasis. “I am just swamped, Leslie can tell you.”

Ann crossed her arms as she watched him. “Okay.”

“Great!” Ben stepped over a pile of notebooks and grabbed the door knob. He turned around and tipped a hat that was not on his head. “Thank you, Leslie.”

“Do you want me to walk you--”

“No, no, I will be fun, I mean fun... fine. I’ll be fine.” 

Leslie fingered the bottom of her skirt and Ben felt his knees give out. He smiled at Ann and tipped his invisible hat again before opening the door and rushing down the hall.

He turned the corner to the front door and felt the wind rush out of him as he ran into something hard. He stumbled backwards and clutched his bag.

“Sorry. Oh! Ben!” 

Ben looked up and saw Andy’s smiling face.

“Hey,” Ben mumbled.

“What are you doing in here? You don’t live here, right?”

“No. I was visiting a friend.”

Andy leaned over and looked down the corner. When he turned back to Ben, he had a small grin on his face and his eyebrows were raised. 

“You were visiting Leslie.” Andy tapped his chin before pointing at Ben. “Sexually.”

Ben squeezed his eyes shut. “No, no, no. She was helping me--”

“Sexually.”

“No.” Ben sighed.

“Sure.” Andy blinked at him and it took Ben a moment to realize that he was trying to wink. “Anyway, I’m here to see April. Sexually.”

“Good Lord.”

“But you’re like a super nerd, right?”

“Hey.”

“I just mean April and I could use help with our algebra homework.” Andy pointed upstairs.

Ben looked down at the binder in his hand and sighed. “I am really busy, Andy.”

“Come on, you can do your homework, too.” 

“How did you know I had homework to do?”

Andy pointed to Ben’s binder. “Leslie makes me a homework binder every semester.”

Ben smiled down at the binder and agreed. He owed Andy for taking care of him on Halloween and he owed it to Leslie to help keep Andy on track with his own homework binder. He followed Andy upstairs and joined him and April in April’s dorm room. Hers was a little messy but nothing like Leslie’s and her roommate’s side of the room was so neatly organized and clean it almost made Ben uncomfortable. 

Apparently, helping Andy and April with homework meant helping them with every single problem they were assigned. But he did get work done because they sporadically made out between problems. The first time Ben was disgusted and didn’t know where to look but by the third make out break, he started utilizing the chunks of time to do his own work. He skimmed three chapters of his philosophy book before his eyes started just wandering over the cover of his binder. Each class had a designated color and written next to the course title was his current grade. He was only passing econ and poli-sci. He only needed a B on his auditing final to pass, but philosophy was a nightmare. According to Leslie’s loopy handwriting, he would need an A on both his essay due on Monday and on his final exam. He groaned and rubbed his palms into his eyes.

“What’s wrong?” Andy asked, his lips finally detaching from April.

“He realized he is going to die alone.”

Andy laughed. “No, he is going to marry Leslie.”

Ben groaned again.

“Wait, you have a crush on Leslie?” April asked.

Ben thought about lying, he thought about leaving, he thought about stabbing his eye with his pen but instead he nodded.

“You’re the reason she kicked Mark out of the band,” April said.

Ben turned around. “She did what?”

April rolled her eyes and pushed off of Andy. Her legs dangled over the side of the bed as she looked at her nails. “She kicked Mark out of the band. Now we don’t have a drummer.”

Andy nodded. “He came to practice a couple weeks ago and Leslie told him to leave. It was pretty intense. Lots of yelling and crying.”

“Andy was mostly crying,” April said.

“He looked so sad!” Andy protested.

April chewed her thumbnail before she spoke again. “Whatever, he sucked.” April shrugged. “Now that weird guy who is obsessed with _Interview with a Vampire_ is drumming for us.”

“Kelly is super cool.” Andy reached behind April’s bed and pulled out a bag of Cheetos and put a handful of cheese curls in his mouth. “He’s only doing it for the dance.”

“You guys are performing at the ball?”

April rolled her eyes. “God, yes. I thought you loved Leslie, shouldn’t you know everything about her because you are a super creepy stalker who has a secret lair and a shrine dedicated to her with pieces of her real hair?”

Ben winced. “No.”

Andy stuffed another handful of Cheetos in his mouth. “Ben was dumped on Halloween.”

April smiled and it both scared Ben and made him feel bad. “Did you cry?”

Ben sighed. “No.”

“He did throw up though. It was super gross.”

“Thank you, I think I will go now.”

“No! Ben! We still have more problems.” Andy put an arm around April, orange crumbs drifting into her hair. “We’ll be nice.”

April growled at Ben but Andy squeezed her shoulder and she stopped, reluctantly grabbing her notebook. Ben eyed them for a moment before turning back to his reading. He couldn’t help the lightness growing in his stomach at the thought of Mark gone, the last of him pushed out when Leslie kicked him out of the band. Whenever he noticed himself smiling, he stopped and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. April asked him a question about exponents, the same question he answered three times already. It was starting to become clear that only Andy needed his help, asking Ben for each step in a new equation while April kept bugging him about exponents. 

Around 10 o’clock, April and Andy were making out and didn’t notice Ben pack up his books. He stretched when he stood, pulling his bag over his shoulder. He grabbed the doorknob and the door squeaked as he opened it.

“Oh, are you leaving?” Andy asked.

“No, don’t go,” April mocked.

“Yeah, it’s late. Thanks for letting me hang out.”

“Wait.” Ben turned around and looked at Andy. His shirt was bunched around his armpit, his stomach was showing but his face was serious. “Leslie is a cool chick and you’re a cool dude. Follow your heart.” Andy reached a hand out toward Ben. “Use your love wings to fly to her.”

“Okay.” Ben raised an eyebrow.

“Your love wings,” Andy sang, “will lead you to her. Oooh Ben. Fly straight into her heart on your love wings. Oooh Ben.”

“Babe,” April whispered, putting her hand on his chest.

Andy blinked and kissed April’s head. “Your love wings,” Andy whispered, pointing at Ben.

Ben smiled. He walked through the door and turned around to thank them but they were already making out again, Andy’s shirt being pulled over his head. Ben quickly shut the door.


	8. Chapter 8

Ben was getting a paper cut right below his index finger. 

He jogged through the large patch of grass between the humanities building and the ASC. The patches of snow crunched under his feet, his lungs pierced by the cold. His gloves were forgotten on his desk back in the humanities building but he wasn’t going back for them. Not now. The cold scratched his fingers and nipped at his face. Ben pulled his beanie down farther on his head, over his ears, the paper in his hand poking his cheek. 

She probably wasn’t even in the ASC yet. He always got there first. After her european history class was over, she popped in, three binders in her gloved hands, her nose a beautiful shade of scarlet. The dance was less than two weeks away, and everyone was preparing for finals, and somehow Leslie was doing both flawlessly. He was put on strict homework duty since he had grades to make up for but he tried to help her anyway. They had spent most of the week, at their usual table, trying to write his philosophy paper, that was now crinkling in his hand, and finalize everything for the ball. 

Ben pulled open the door and glanced at Jerry, who was busy on the phone and munching on a small box of donuts. Ben quickly looked up and toward their table. He took two steps before he stopped. 

She shouldn’t be here first, she never was. The unspoken deal was he would sit and tutor someone for about a half hour until she showed up, carrying supplies and bundled up in two sweatshirts and a leather or denim jacket. She would shed her layers and reveal her Sharpie reminders on her wrists, across her palms or along her forearm. As it got closer to finals and the dance, the reminders increased. Leslie would sit and open her work, exhaling as if she was ready to relax. In a way, Ben came to finally realize, working was her way to relax. She was like the Energizer Bunny of college students. 

She wasn’t supposed to be here and although she was exactly the person he wanted to see, exactly the reason he ran across campus, he wasn’t prepared to see her. His fist tightened around his paper and the sound of it crinkling in his hand echoed throughout the quiet room. Or maybe just in his ears, he couldn’t tell. He took a breath and swallowed, running his tongue over his cold lips. The door opened behind him and he saw some one sit down out of the corner of his eye. Ben heard Jerry hang up the phone.

“Oh hi, Ben!”

Ben kept his eyes forward and she turned. Her cheeks were rouged and the hood of her sweatshirt still held flakes of snow. She gave him a weary and excited smile. Her eyes drifted to his hand and back to his eyes before she stood up. He moved quickly across the room and when she reached down to take his paper from his hands, he felt dizzy by the familiar smell of vanilla and ink.

She unrolled and unfolded the paper and he watched her eyes roam over the type, up to the top where his name was. Right next to a bold red A. Her mouth scooped up into a smile, her eyes widening, as she looked back up at him. Leslie bounced on her heels and bit her lip, squealing behind her closed mouth.

Ben pulled the paper from her hands and let it drop to the floor. He wrapped his arms around her waist, under her arms, and squeezed, picking her up in a tight embrace. Her hands grabbed on to the back of his jacket while her face buried into his neck. 

Feeling her in his arms brought him back to this same spot months ago, when Leslie finally got a passing grade on her math test. It brought him back to the coffee shop, dust on his clothes with the warmth of her body engulfing him. It brought him back to her bed, papers and text books jabbing into his back while she tickled him, his hands guiding her closer, and the muscles of her legs around his waist. 

She shook and squealed again against his neck. He stumbled back and her giggles shook through his chest. He chuckled, too, out of excitement, relief, and clumsiness. He staggered forward and Leslie pulled from him as he started to gently put her back on the ground. But his eyes traced her and he felt the air push from his lungs and he held on. Leslie’s smile took over her entire face; her cheeks were rounded, her lips turned up as far as they could go, her eyes crinkled and sparkling. He just wanted to push her golden bangs from her face and kiss her.

So he did.

Her hair was smooth and soft against his fingertips but it was nothing compared to the feeling of her lips on his. He pushed both hands through her hair and to her neck, pulling her as close as he could, as close as physically possible, even though it was never enough. He smoothed his hands forward, so he could feel her chin move as she kissed him, line her jaw as she opened her mouth, and trace the softness of her skin as she sighed along his lips.

He pulled back, suddenly aware of their surroundings, gently kissing her one more time before letting his forehead rest on hers. His hands stayed rooted to her neck, his thumbs brushing against the skin. Leslie’s eyes scanned the room and he saw her cheeks redden even more. He pushed from her and looked around and saw a few eyes looking at them from behind books and Jerry was mid-donut, his eyes big on them.

“He got an A,” Leslie explained to the room. 

“Yeah, I--”

“He worked really hard on it,” Leslie shouted.

“It was just a big deal so.”

“It’s fine, he just got an A so we kissed each other on each other’s mouths. And it was awesome.”

Ben turned to her and smiled. “Yeah.” He smoothed his hands around her waist and bent down.

“Ben!”

“Sorry.”

Ben straightened and pulled his hands away from her. People slowly went back to what they were doing while Ben kept his eyes on the ground, his face stretched in a goofy smile. He bent down and picked up his paper and glanced at the A again before folding it twice. He cleared his throat.

“So should we get to work?” he asked, looking back at Leslie.

She was shutting binders and books and capping pens, dumping her things into her bag.

“Um, no,” she said, shoving another textbook into the bag, “we are going to go celebrate your A.”

Ben followed her through the door and onto the cement path toward their dorms. He watched snow fall into her hair until she raised her shoulders and pulled her hood over her head. His insides were turning and twisting, uncertainty and excitement pulsing through him. He still felt her lips on his, the warmth of her touch, the electricity of her fingers on his neck. It was all so distracting, it kept him from asking questions or focusing completely on the small blur in front of him that he was blindly following. 

When her building came into view, she turned her head back to him. Her chin hit her shoulder and her hood covered half of her face. She smiled at him, her pink nose scrunching. Her eyes fell to her hand and he followed her gaze, her palm reaching toward him, fingers stretched. He slowly outstretched his hand. Her fingers were cold, but her touch pulsed warmth into his hand, up his arm, and through his entire body. Leslie pulled and he skipped to her side. With her free hand, she grabbed his beanie and pulled it over his ears.

Her fingers trailed down his jaw and he wanted to pull her into him but they were at the door of Rossmor Hall and she needed both of her hands to get her keys. He stuffed his hands into his pocket and waited until she unlocked the door. He followed her down the hall. 

Ben passed her and stood in the middle of her room while she grabbed a scrunchie from Ann’s headboard and put it around the door knob. His heart began to thud in his chest and he couldn’t get it to slow down. Ben slid his backpack off his shoulders and placed it on the floor. He was hot, so he took off his beanie and held it in his hand. Leslie locked the door and turned around. She took off her hood and shook her hair loose. He could see where the snow had started to melt, creating dark spots around her blonde locks. 

Leslie shrugged off her denim jacket and threw it over her desk chair before moving on to her hoodie, draping it over her jacket. The underside of her wrist said #10-40 ODD in black marker, but the rest of her arms were uncharacteristically blank. Her hair fell in front of her face as she looked down, smoothing the wrinkles of her white Patti Smith t-shirt. 

“You kissed me.” Her voice was so quiet, unlike her, unlike the girl who just rushed out of the ASC to get him to her dorm room.

Ben swallowed. “Yes.”

“I have wanted you to kiss me for so long,” she said, “even when it wasn’t right.”

He felt his heart squeeze and a wave of guilt crashed over him. He looked down at his hands, twisting and pulling on the fabric of his beanie.

“Me too.” He nodded, finally throwing the stupid beanie on her bed. 

She pushed her bangs out of her face and looked up. “I almost kissed you at the coffee shop.”

Ben’s stomach sunk as a small smile crept on to his lips. He could feel the heat moving up his neck and into his cheeks. He walked up to her and lined his thumb along her calc homework assignment on her wrist, up the faint vein on the underside of her arm until he found her neck. She nuzzled into his palm and the way she melted into his touch made him pull her into him.

“Me too.”

His free hand joined his other behind her neck and she slowly opened her eyes, shifting her gaze to his. He smiled and placed his forehead on hers. His thumbs swirled onto her skin, his knuckles grazing the bottom of her ear lobes. Her hair moved over the top of his hands.

“I almost kissed you when you quoted Abigail Adams.” Leslie rubbed her nose across Ben’s and her face scrunched, embarrassed. Ben dragged his thumb across her jaw, up to her chin and lined her bottom lip.

“I almost kissed you when we watched Sleeping Beauty,” he admitted, pulling her lip down, just to see it move against his thumb. He hummed.

She lifted, pushing on her toes, and he felt her lips, feather light against his, as she spoke. “I almost kissed you when I got that B.”

Leslie kissed him, a sigh spilling from her as she fell into him. He gripped her head, pulling her to his lips, steadying her. He threaded his fingers through her hair. She immediately pushed off his jacket, lining her fingers on the bottom of his shirt, letting her hands skim his waist, his stomach, the small of his back. He pushed into her, her touches creating a need for her to be closer. Her back hit the door and he still pressed into her. He felt every breath she took and every moan that escaped her mouth. He pulled down on her chin, to gain access to her mouth. Her tongue was warm and soft but was just as rushed as his. 

He didn’t want to speed this process along but he couldn’t stop his fingers from poking underneath her shirt, the skin on her stomach not enough, so he would move on to her back, her hips. He slid his hands up her stomach, letting his fingertips graze the bottom of her bra and down again. Leslie arched her back with his touch. He pushed back when her hips grazed his thigh and his hands got more daring with each thrust. His fingers snuck over the clasp of her bra before pushing down her back again and she groaned into his mouth, her hips bucking against him. He did it again and she whimpered at the absence of his fingers at the clasp. 

Leslie’s arms flew above her head and she ground into his leg with a moan. He pulled away, opening his eyes, their noses smashed together as he searched her face.

“Ben, come on,” she whispered. 

He pulled her shirt over her head and took a step back to look at her. Her bra was simple but it was black and he could feel his dick pushing against his jeans. He traced her body, taking in the plump rise of her breasts, the creamy white of her skin, the flat plain of her stomach. Leslie undid the clasp and zipper of her jeans and they fell down her hips. On her left hip was a simple outline of a heart. He reached forward and rubbed his thumb over it, expecting it to smear but it didn’t. Ben kept his thumb over it and flicked his eyes up to her.

She smiled. “Ann and I got matching tattoos last year.”

Ben kissed her neck, over her collarbone and back up to her lips. He lightly traced her breast over her bra, the fabric smooth along his fingers. Leslie pushed her hands up his chest and he inhaled at her swift touch. She pulled his shirt over his head and pushed him back, over stacks of books and piles of papers, to her bed. She pushed him onto the mattress and she slinked her way up his body, pausing at the button of his jeans. She undid the button and unzipped his fly. Her fingers lingered over the rise in his boxers. 

He felt self conscious as she kept her gaze low, slowly grazing her palm over his crotch, easing his pants open. She pushed her thumb up the outline of his shaft and he grabbed her leg, his hand slapping against her jeans. Leslie stopped and sat back on her feet and Ben blinked, focusing on her.

“I was last tested July 12th,” Leslie started, her breathing suddenly even and her voice serious, “I was negative for Chlamydia, Hepatitis B and C, Gonorrhea, both types of herpes, Syphillis, and HIV. Oh, and I’m on birth control.”

Ben blinked again, trying to speak but nothing came out. She adjusted her bra and he couldn’t stop staring at her fingers gliding across her skin. She dropped her hands and looked back at him.

“When were you last tested?”

He wasn’t having a lot of sex with a lot of girls so he couldn’t remember. He knew he went to some testing awareness day at the student health clinic and everything came back fine. But that was before Shauna, and Cindy Eckert, who gave him a sloppy blow job at a “reunion” party in June. 

“Um, well.” Ben cleared his throat. Leslie tilted her head and crossed her arms and fuck, her breasts looked amazing. “I got tested some time last semester and I was clean.”

Leslie twisted her mouth and looked at the ceiling. She bobbed her head from side to side, obviously fighting some inner battle. He waited, unsure of where to look or put his hands.

“Well, you can’t be too careful.”

Leslie jumped off her bed and rummaged through a drawer of her dresser. She picked out a condom and tossed it at him. The Sweetums girl looked at him with her usual cheery disposition. Ben turned it over in his hands and read the flavor: Cherry Gasm. He felt Leslie’s hand on his crotch again and he dropped the condom on his chest. 

He groaned when her hand moved again, over his hip and to the sides of his jeans. She tucked her fingers under his boxers and pulled. His shoes fell onto the floor with a thud and she threw his pants to the ground. She stepped out of her own boots and pulled down her pants. Ben reached for her and smoothed his hands over her hips, against her thighs, letting his fingers trace the outline of her pink panties. She shivered under his touch, grabbing the condom from his chest. He kept his eyes on her, following his hands roaming over her lower body. She was so tiny, his fingers splayed across her hip perfectly. 

The bed shifted under her weight and Ben hissed as she rolled the condom on. He reached for her but before he could touch her, her mouth was on him and he couldn’t move.

Her mouth was so fucking warm. She lined her tongue over the underside of his cock before she wrapped her lips around him and slowly took him in. She bobbed, turning her head with each descend and sucking beautifully when her head moved up. Her hands lightly smoothed up and down his thighs. Leslie adjusted closer to him, pushing his legs apart to accommodate her body. He felt her breasts graze his legs, his balls, the base of his dick. He moaned, trying to steady himself from thrusting into her mouth. 

Leslie swirled her tongue along his tip and then pushed down again, taking him to the back of her throat.

“Good Lord,” he whispered, putting a hand behind his head.

His other hand found her hair and he tangled his fingers between her locks. She moaned, sending the vibration through his cock. He groaned, tightening his grip. Leslie wrapped her hand around him and pumped along with her mouth. Her thumb pushed down on the underside of his shaft and her breasts brushed his balls. He moaned loudly, the sound bouncing off the walls. She moved faster, her hand twisting with each pump now, her tongue clumsy but everywhere on his dick. He felt her skin all over him, her legs against his, her breasts on the base of his dick, her hand on his shaft. The heat rose from his legs, circling in his gut and he knew he was close, and she must have known because she moved faster, her moans pulsing against him.

He gripped her hair and immediately apologized and dropped his hand but she only moved faster. He gripped her comforter and willed his hips to stay still. Leslie twisted her hand, her fingers gripping tighter, her mouth moving faster. He moaned her name and she quickened her speed again and then she groaned, low and in her throat, and he exploded.

His hands found her hair again as he tried to calm his breathing. He took in sharp, quick breaths, exhales mixed with her name and groans. She traced her tongue up his shaft and back down again before sitting up. Ben whimpered at the sight of her plump, red lips, wet and swollen. She delicately wiped her fingers over her mouth and then sat back on her legs. 

Ben took a few more calming breaths before he stood up on shaky limbs. He grabbed his pants before she stopped him, pointing to a trash can under her desk. She looked away. He disposed the condom and came back to the bed, his head slightly dizzy and sleepy warmth filling his body.

He lazily trailed his fingers up her arm and bent down to kiss her. The artificial flavoring was sweet on her lips, her tongue warm. He reached behind her and unclasped her bra, sliding the material slowly from her back, taking each strap down. He threw it onto the floor and they fell back on the bed, Ben’s body still shaky. Leslie sighed into his kisses as he rubbed his hand across her stomach, over her hips, and between her breasts. He kissed across her cheek and down to her neck, sucking on the crook between her pulse point and her collarbone. His tongue circled her skin before his lips tugged on her flesh. Leslie’s hips bucked and she grabbed onto his hair. Her delicate pull made his teeth graze her skin, his lips suck harder. His hand was motionless on her stomach as his mouth worked. She sighed and groaned, his name trickling out of her. 

Leslie tightened her hold on his hair and arched her back and Ben’s lips detached from her neck. He kissed back to her mouth, sliding his tongue across her bottom lip before his hand moved down. 

He turned his head and nuzzled onto her chest. He kept his eyes on his hand, scooping over her hips and across her thighs, up over her stomach and down again. Leslie bucked and moved her hips to his hands but he teased her, rolling his fingers away from where she wanted him. She whimpered when his hand grazed the front of her underwear and he smiled into her skin. Ben smoothed his hand up to her breast and rolled his thumb over her nipple, hard and pink under his touch. She hissed and rolled her hips and he moaned, quickly guiding his hand back down.

She curved her back with his touch. His fingers pushed under the soft cotton of her underwear and he sighed at the feeling of her. Leslie was everything strong and powerful, but under his hands she felt so soft and warm. He grazed her, teasing her, sliding his fingers lightly over her. She groaned and whimpered with each passing of his fingers. He watched the bump of his hand move under the pink cotton before he finally pushed onto her clit with one, long circle. 

“Ben,” she whispered, “I... oh, I...”

He kept circling, enjoying the hitch in her voice, the way she couldn’t form words because of his touch. Ben explored her, felt the slick softness of each ridge. She hissed and bucked against his hand, obviously needing him faster, but he was doing this for the first time and he wanted to remember every detail. He already had her hips memorized, how he could wrap his hand around the curve, how her hip bones pushed against his thumbs. The perfect round of her breasts, the shade of her pearl-white skin, the softness of her lips. He was studying her and she just needed her to wait, to let him feel her.

Ben pushed a finger inside and groaned, desperate for her on his lips, grazing them lazily along the top of her breast. He pulled out and pushed two fingers in, curling and twisting to feel the soft ridges of her walls. How he fit inside her, how a certain move of his fingers made her clench around him. He tried to listen to her breathing, how her voice hitched with each movement, or if she became suddenly quiet. He turned his hand as he pulled out. He outlined her. His fingers trailed up to her clit, circling, before descending back to her opening. He lined her, on the outside and in. When he pushed back into her, he used three fingers, and he relished in the stretch. He devoured how wet she was, and the way her moan seemed to escape from deep down in her chest, and Ben realized something.

Leslie was different. Leslie made him stop and consume her. He didn’t need to rush, he didn’t need the quick satisfaction of getting her off, or the incessant need to have himself inside of her mouth or inside of her pussy to feel complete, whole, taken care of. Being able to just touch her, listen to the sounds that fell from her mouth, feel the air from her breath push against his hair, watch his own hand move under her panties, lazily lick and kiss her breast just to have more of her, was what made him complete. He felt dizzy in her as he pushed into her, he felt concentrative as he tried to register her signs, to learn how her body worked, what she liked, and what didn’t interest her. He tried to whisper her name to see if she responded (she did) and he bit her nipple to see if she would moan (she didn’t). 

No one demanded his attention like Leslie. No one called for the detail, the care, the obsessive inventory like Leslie. It made his fingers slow, his lips careful. It made him moan when he wasn’t even being touched, it made her name fall from his lips like a reminder, as if to say “I know you don’t need me to take care of you, but I care about you enough to do it anyway.” Because that was the thing about Leslie, she could take care of everything in her life, but this, this affection, he could take care of for her. Gladly.

He rolled his tongue over her nipple, smooth and erect along his lips. He pushed into her, over and over, her moans quickening and her breaths short. She clawed at the back of his neck, her nails driving into his scalp and onto the sensitive flesh. He curled his fingers and moaned with her. He quickly pulled out of her and moved up to her clit and rubbed circles around it. Leslie gasped and screamed, and he removed his lips from her breast and pushed them onto her mouth. Ben’s fingers kept moving, clumsier and faster than he would like, but the way she groaned kept him moving. She grabbed his hair, both hands pushed into the back of his head. She gripped him closer and her moans vibrated his lips. Her hips bucked into his hand and he could feel the added friction she was giving, the slight circle of her hips to add that one last element, the one that would bring her over. He whispered her name and she captured his lips and her hips pushed against his hand as she screamed.

Ben pushed her lips open and let the scream fill his mouth. It rocked against his tongue as he felt her body shake. He ran his fingers down and into her and she gripped him in surprise, her moans still pushing through. He just wanted to feel the aftershock, how her pussy clenched around him, how the small spasms pushed on his fingertips. He gently moved, pushing in and out with a slow and tender thrust. She turned to him and he slipped out of her, trailing his slick fingers up her side and around her back. Leslie wrapped her leg around his and snuggled into him and he could feel it all, every effect. The shake in her muscles, the short breaths on his chest, the calm that radiated off her skin. He rubbed circles into her back and let his eyes close and he inhaled. Vanilla and the sweet smell of her and sweat. 

Leslie kissed his chest. He sighed into her hair, his hand smoothing down to her ass. He could feel her smile against his skin and her lips puckered, kissing him again.

“I have calc homework to do,” she whispered.

Ben only gripped her tighter, humming.

“And some dance stuff, too.” 

Ben groaned.

“And you have homework to do, Benji.”

God even his stupid name that he swore never to use again sounded beautiful on her lips.

Leslie slowly untangled herself from him and pulled on her jeans. She grabbed an oversized IU hoodie and put it on, zipping it closed over her bare chest. She looked so little in that sweatshirt, and her hair was piled on top of her head in a sloppy mess. The sight of her was what brought him out of bed, out of his reach. He stood up and grabbed her hand and kissed it.

“What color is your dress for the ball?” 

Leslie giggled into her hand, covered by the long sleeve of her sweatshirt.

“Is that your way of asking me to the dance?” Her bright eyes trailed down his body and up again. “Naked?”

His neck felt hot and his cheeks were probably red but he stood his ground. “Yup.”

She looked him over again and he desperately wished he had put on clothes. “There’s something about you that makes me conform to an old fashioned, male dominated, idealistic view of social norms.” 

Ben arched an eyebrow and turned her hand over, kissing the ink on her wrist. He felt her muscles loosen and watched her body relax. Having an affect on her was intoxicating, special.

“Red,” she said, pulling him down to her lips, “my dress is red.”


	9. Chapter 9

Twenty minutes ago, Leslie pulled out a portable record player from under her bed and put on _The Velvet Underground and Nico_. His eyes followed her fingers, placing the needle on a specific line and before he could appreciate the soft, gut warming sound, she was on top of him.

Leslie had been making them work in the ASC, each night, until it closed because they couldn’t get anything done in private (and the library was out of the question). Alone, Ben’s lips would find her neck or her fingers would push through his hair over and over until homework or dance planning was forgotten. 

He didn’t mind, though. Ben was getting to know her even more, at their little table, around campus, during First Wave practice. He learned Leslie liked to hold hands between classes, but liked to snuggle into his chest while they waited for their food in the cafeteria. That she enjoyed drawing on his Doc Martins with white out and that her love of waffles and whipped cream went beyond just a favorite food, to an almost unhealthy obsession that might result in type 2 diabetes some day. He learned that her hair felt softest during a snow storm and her lips were pushy and electric no matter the weather conditions.

She taught him how to do a few chords on the guitar and that he should be thankful for his horrible parents because she only had one. He learned she loved her hometown, that nowhere compared to the raccoon infested parks and Pawnee’s horrific history. Leslie first heard a Clash song in her ex best friend’s bedroom when they were 15 and she became quickly invested. 

Leslie always stayed up late studying and woke early to check in on the decorations that were slowly coming in. She had to be ten minutes early to class and be the last to leave. Ben learned that she liked to kiss him, no matter who was watching, and that Hillary was the real brains behind the Clinton administration. 

Ben rolled them over and he kissed over her shirt, the soft scent of vanilla and silkscreen ink filling his nose. He licked across the sliver of skin above her jeans and then sat up on his knees, unbuttoning and unzipping her pants before sliding them off of her. She let out a small sigh and he flicked his eyes to her and he groaned at the sight of her, flushed and dopey-eyed. He quickly pulled her underwear off before she could register that she should be lifting her hips to help him. Ben kissed her stomach and descended over her skin. 

His fingers dug into her flesh. He wanted to taste her, but the anticipation was too great. She rolled her hips and whimpered and if he was a more self controlled guy, he could stay in the plain between her belly button and her pussy forever. But he wasn’t.

Ben inhaled and smoothed a finger over her and Leslie gasped. Her hands smacked his shoulders and she pulled on his shirt. She pulled it off of him and fell back to the bed.

“I love your bony shoulders.”

Ben decided to not look too far into ‘love’ being whispered in the hot air and let his lips fall onto her.

Another thing he learned about Leslie was she loved this.

He learned this because after one day of knowing he was STD free, she shyly asked for it.

_“Ben,” she whispered, “Ben. Ben.”_

_His fingers were working over her, curling so her hips would buck and smoothing across her opening to her clit so she would moan. He watched her breasts move with her body as she thrust against his hand. Ben could hear the want in her voice but he figured it was for the way he played along her pussy, how he twisted his wrist with each push._

_“Ben.”_

_“Leslie,” he whispered back, kissing her neck._

_“Will you... ah, will you go...”_

_He hummed against her neck and kept rubbing her clit, faster as if her incoherent gasping words were just the encouragement he needed to help push her over. She grasped at his hand but when he smoothed back to her opening and pushed, her hand fell back to the mattress._

_“Ben.”_

_“Leslie.”_

_Leslie groaned and moved from his hand but he followed, pushing kisses down her neck and to her collarbone. She groaned and arched her back and he smiled on her skin before circling his tongue and sucking on her flesh. Her hand found his hair and she gripped, pulling. He nipped at her and groaned with another pull of her fingers._

_She took a few quick breaths and Ben thought she was close, quickening his touch. But she pulled his hair, hard, and yelled._

_“Will you go down on me, you idiot!”_

Looking back, she maybe didn’t ask for it shyly, more like she demanded it because he was, in her words, an idiot.

Leslie was already addicting, but eating her out was his own personal addiction problem that would take more than 12 steps to eradicate. 

Everything about it was intoxicating. The smell and taste of her, the way she pushed against his face, how her hands gripped his hair to pull him closer. The way her voice rose and her moans turned into screams. He craved the soft flesh of her ass in the palm of his hand, and his mouth watered before she was even undressed. He had gone down on girls before but none of them came undone the way Leslie did. She would forget the thin dorm room walls and his pain threshold. Sometimes he thought he would lose some of his hair in her grip but he just flicked his tongue faster or plunged into her deeper and she would loosen her grip, falling back to the bed. 

They hadn’t gotten to sex yet but neither of them seemed to mind.

Ben pushed his tongue over her clit and wrapped his lips around it, sucking and flicking so he could feel her legs shake on his bony shoulders. He palmed her ass with one hand and stroked her lightly with the other, his tongue concentrating on her clit. She was being loud and her back was curved beautifully in a passionate arch and he wished he could be this close to her all the time. Buried in her, engulfed in her. 

Ben growled and and she yelped with a long sigh. He heard her hands clawing at the sheets, felt them in his hair. Her heels dug into his back. He moved his tongue quicker, pushed his fingers into her with a curl. He flicked his eyes up to her and could only see her long, smooth neck. Her chin was raised and facing the ceiling. Leslie’s breasts rose and fell with each deep, quick breath. 

He watched them move, taking their rise and fall to guide his tongue and his rhythm. Her breathing quickened, so he did, when she held her breath, he stopped his fingers while his tongue still moved. He may have been clueless when she first wanted this, but he swore to be more observant of her and to listen and so far it was working out.

Really well.

Her breaths quickened and they never slowed so his tongue matched her, lapping and twirling around her clit as each of her muscles tightened. She rocked against his face, pushing her feet into his back to get closer. Leslie’s back fell to the bed and then she arched again, yelling his name and pushing into his face. He slid his fingers out of her and pushed his tongue in, wanting to feel the pulses of her aftershock with his tongue, feel her shake against his lips. Her body went limp as he slowly lapped at her, just enough to keep her sighing and twitching. 

Addicted.

He licked over her clit to just below her belly button where he pursed his lips and kissed her. She sighed and he crawled up her body, wiping his mouth along the way to her lips. Leslie opened her mouth to him and her tongue swiped at his in desperation, like she hadn’t kissed him for years.

He curled into her side, wrapping his clothed leg with her bare one. Ben skimmed her skin with his fingers in lazy patterns. Leslie’s eyelids fluttered closed but she struggled to keep them open, trying to stay awake, trying to get more things done before the sun rose. He kissed her cheek, her neck, her cheek again. Ben placed her blanket over their bodies.

“You’ll wake up in three hours, just go to sleep,” he whispered, his lips grazing her skin.

She moaned a protest but her breathing was low and rhythmic before his own eyelids closed.

//

Ben walked out of his last philosophy class, his fingers still shaking from nerves. There was nothing he could do now but wait for his grades to come to his mom’s house over winter break.

For now, he needed to register for spring.

Leslie was waiting for him outside. She had two hot chocolates in her hands. She kept blinking while looking at the sky, trying to keep the snow from falling in her eyes while relishing in the flakes landing on her cheeks. He wanted to shake her and tell her he loved her but it was hard to tell where amazement and inspiration ended and love began so he kept that declaration to himself, for now.

She pushed on her tiptoes to kiss him and he met her half way. He grabbed a hot chocolate and they started toward the administration building.

“How did it go?” Leslie asked.

“I think it went okay. How was history?”

“Easy.” She smiled and leaned into his shoulder.

Ben nodded and followed her into the building where they brushed off their shoulders and arms, sighing in the amazing heat of the indoors. As expected, the room was packed with other students looking through catalogues and writing down course numbers. Leslie dug into her pocket for their schedules and got in line. Ben smiled down at his paper while Leslie sipped her coco. They would be taking an English class together since they both put the requirement off.

They shuffled forward as the line moved.

“Do you think you’ll go to graduate school?” Ben asked.

Leslie scrunched her face and shook her head, her hair slightly damp from melting snow as it swayed.

“No, I want to start working.”

Ben smiled. “You know, to be president, you usually have to go to graduate school.”

“I have to be 35, a US citizen, and a resident of the United States for fourteen years.” She elbowed him. “And a total badass.” 

“Okay, okay.” He put up his hand in protest and she pulled on his jacket and kissed him. He wanted to throw his hot chocolate across the room to punish it for occupying his hand.

“Next.”

Leslie pushed off of Ben and scurried over to the counter. She stood on her tiptoes in excitement, shoving the paper across the surface. Leslie turned around and motioned for Ben to join her.

“I’m waiting for my turn.” He motioned to the line behind him. Leslie rolled her eyes and motioned again. This time he walked up behind her.

“Hello Ethel, you look lovely today.” Leslie smiled.

On the other side of the counter, the older woman with the bored expression swatted her hand toward Leslie. “Whatever.”

“Here’s my schedule for next semester, I was thinking, spring 1996 would be full of--”

“Are you taking any of these pass/fail?” Ethel asked, typing into the computer, her eyes on the screen.

“No.” 

Ben let the women talk while he looked at his shoes. He wondered what winter break would be like without seeing Leslie everyday, if a trip to Pawnee would be plausible. He’d love to spend more time with her instead of in Partridge.

Ben looked up as Leslie took his paper from his hand. 

“This is Ben Wyatt’s list.” Leslie handed Ethel the paper. “He’s my boyfriend.” Leslie whispered, winking.

Ethel sighed and typed into the computer. “What about you, lover boy, are you taking any classes pass/fail?” Ben shook his head. “Your business class is full.”

“Is there a wait list?” Ben asked, his stomach turning. Choosing classes was a nightmare.

“You’ll be third.”

“That’s okay, put me on it.” Ben cleared his throat. “Please.”

“Sure.”

Ethel printed out their confirmed schedules and handed both of them to Leslie. 

“Thank you, Ethel, have a wonderful winter break!” Leslie beamed, grabbing her hot chocolate.

“Maybe.” Ethel said, turning back to the line. “Next.”

Ben checked his watch as they walked out of the building. He had an hour until his auditing final, so he let Leslie guide him wherever she wanted to go. 

Apparently where she wanted to go was his dorm room.

She was wearing so many layers and he kept hitting his head on the top bunk. But her lips were so fast and soft and the warmth from her mouth was intoxicating. Leslie sighed when he finally touched her skin, slipping his hand under her shirt, spreading his fingers across her stomach. They fumbled to get her t-shirt off, an arm still stuck in a plaid that was half unbuttoned. She giggled and he groaned but his lips were turned up and their teeth kept bumping and, God, even bumping teeth and elbowing each other was better than anything he had ever had with anyone else. 

Leslie sloppily kissed his stomach as her hands worked on the clasp of his pants. She tugged at his pants and her breasts slid on his dick. He gasped and tried to grab her hair but his hand fell to his own leg.

“Do you have a condom?” she asked. She was out of breath as she stood up, pulling off his jeans.

“Uh.” He watched her take off her ow pants and she stepped out of her boots and flung everything across the room. Her thumbs hooked in her panties and she pulled and he lost all ability to think. “Um.” She kicked her underwear at him. 

She rolled her eyes but smiled softly. “I might have one in my backpack.”

Leslie bent over and looked through her bag and Ben moaned. Her legs were so short and smooth and the beautiful round of her ass captivated him while she dug in her bag. The sound of paper and pens mixed with her whispered curses was the perfect soundtrack to the sight of her. Every few seconds she pushed back her bangs and he was jealous of her fingers.

“Yes,” she whispered. She sprang up and tore the wrapper.

“Leslie.”

“Hm?” Leslie gripped him and stroked. He groaned, relishing in the soft touch of her fingers as she rolled on the condom.

He wanted to tell her that a small break between finals wasn’t his idea of a perfect first time. He was planning to take her out after the dance for waffles and hot chocolate and he’d put on The Velvet Underground or Blondie and they would make out for who knows how long and then he’d ask her if it was okay and she would hopefully say yes but if she didn’t that was fine. But she was blowing everything out of the water by yanking him into his dorm room between finals and elbowing him in the chest to get their clothes off and now she was straddling him and he could feel her warmth over the tip of his cock.

“Leslie.” 

Her fingers traced his dick but all he wanted was her, all of her, the closest he could be to her.

Fuck plans. Nothing with Leslie was planned, everything with Leslie was like a series of accidents that turned out to be godsends.

“Are you okay?” Leslie sighed and he felt her, just the surface of her, on him.

He took a deep breath, his entire body throbbing, his limbs shaking, like he had never fucked a girl before. He nodded.

Leslie looked down, her body bent at an awkward angle to compensate for the low ceiling. She kept her hand between them as she leaned forward, her face inches from his. Ben’s hands scooped over her hips, her back, and he gripped her hair, not to pull but to just feel. Her eyes moved around his face. Ben rubbed his hands into her hair and trailed his fingers down her neck, over her back and up to her hair again. Feeling her hair, her skin, and her muscles move made soft heat waves pulse through his body. Leslie inhaled slowly and her breath was shaky on the exhale, tickling his lips and warming his face. 

He almost said it, he almost threw caution to the wind and said he loved her whether he knew he really did or not. But before he could take a breath, Leslie lowered herself onto him and he forgot how to form words. 

She gasped and stilled. He could feel every part of her surrounding him; he could feel her breaths in his hands and along his stomach and in his cock. He was as close as he could ever be to her. Leslie shifted her hips forward and he moaned, the sound choked in his throat. She smiled and his eyes fluttered closed when her hips rolled again. Ben thrust with her next roll and she moaned, her eyelids falling and mouth open. He sighed when she opened her eyes again. He pulled, his hands anchored at the back of her neck and kissed her. 

Leslie’s mouth moved in beautiful synchronization with her hips. He let her guide him, following her tongue’s slow circles and pushing against her hips when she smoothed them over his. Finding a rhythm was awkward and uneasy: trying to find the right pacing for the other, moving hands to the most comfortable position, and listening for sounds and signs that things were going well. But it didn’t matter, just doing this was enough, just feeling every inch of her was enough. Her thighs against his, her feet under his legs, her hands around his shoulders, her breasts on his chest, her stomach on his, her lips pushing his mouth open. Every part of her was tangled with every part of him and it almost felt like too much, but that was impossible. 

Ben moved his hands to the side of her face and rubbed her cheeks with his thumbs as he pulled away. He smiled at her as her eyes roamed his chest. She pushed herself off of his stomach and hit her head on the bottom of Chris’s bunk.

“Oh my God,” Ben said. “Oh my God, are you okay? I’m so sorry.” 

He reached for her, pushing his hand underneath her own that was rubbing furiously on the back of her head. He smoothed his fingers over the spot that already seemed to be growing and felt warm at his touch. Her face was scrunched in pain but she was cursing and giggling. Her hips still moved in small, slow circles that he would like to say he didn’t notice but his eyes kept closing so he could focus on the bump on her head. Ben sat up slowly and twisted his head to kiss her neck, her cheeks, and the top of her head.

“Are you okay?”

Leslie nodded with a pout. He kissed each eyelid and her lips, bringing her back down on top of him as he slowly fell to the bed. They kissed, her hips slowly moving, just enough to keep his legs twitching and the muscles in his stomach clenching. He kept his hand protectively on her head. He slowly pushed from the bed and when he slipped out of her they both whimpered. Leslie smiled and kissed him.

“Is it okay, I mean, the bed isn’t ideal because--”

“You talk too much.” Leslie smiled and in one swift motion pulled him to the ground and straddled him, impaling herself with his cock before he could even take a breath.

“Fuck,” he breathed, gripping her hips. 

She smiled and rocked her hips, quicker than before. Leslie was stretched long and beautiful on top of him, her breasts moving with each push of her hips. He watched her ride him, her hair bouncing and her eyes fluttering closed when he would thrust back. The roll of her hips quickened and his back began to burn, the rug Chris insisted they put down for “an improved bagwa” scraping against his skin. His feet were cold on the tile but Leslie quickly warmed him. She scraped her nails down his chest and grinned as she took him in. He could feel the heat rising in his neck, up to his cheeks. He pushed his fingers into the flesh of her waist and reached for her breast, rolling a nipple between his fingers and she groaned, her hips instantly quickening.

The icy heat that pushed up his legs and into his balls ripped at his gut. He tried to close his eyes and think about baseball or the Hoth battle but he missed the image of her. He liked watching her mouth fall open, her hands flailing to grab something, the feel of her thigh muscles working against his hips. She was warm and slick around him and he just wanted to be one hundred percent in this moment, but he also wanted her to cum. 

Ben had become somewhat of a master at doing this, but usually with his mouth on her. It took a few tries and a lot of giggling and instructions but mostly she didn’t seem to mind if he was down there for ten minutes or forty-five. But this was different. He was building quicker than he was probably supposed to (he was not a complete idiot, after all) and he needed to start figuring out how to get her to her own peak. 

So he explored her. He kept in mind what worked when he fingered her, what his tongue did that made her scream. Studying her and trying to figure out what made her hips roll faster, what kept her leg shaking, what quickened her breaths helped keep his mind off of his own orgasm. It all felt so desperate and rushed and there was no reason not to go with that feeling, because that is exactly what this was. And there would be other times.

Running his fingers over her taut nipples made her legs tighten around him and pushing his thumb against her clit made her moan and scream. He alternated pressure until he felt a frantic rhythm build with his thumb circling her clit, his other fingers sprawled out on her lower stomach. He could see his fingers indenting her skin and his fingertips were white. She panted his name and gripped her hair, her back arching and breasts pushing toward him in a vision that his fantasies could never even dream of. Leslie was moving so fast, so sporadic that his fingers couldn’t keep up but he had the vague idea that she was manipulating his touch, she was moving against him to her advantage. 

He was right. His name from her lips reached a higher pitch and she moved fast and without coordination. He felt her leg shake and heard her breaths become sporadic and then she tightened around him. Leslie gripped her hair and held on as she yelled out his name with an interesting blend of curses. She rode it out, slow and careful, each thrust against him resulting in a quiver that ran through his body. He ran his hands up her stomach, over her breasts, and back again.

Leslie bent down and kissed him and he held on to the back of her head, keeping her there. She slowly rocked her hips, still sensitive and throbbing around him. He rolled them over, careful to hold on to the back of her head. Their noses bumped as he adjusted above her. She smiled as he pulled away and her arms fell behind her head and she sighed. 

He wanted to say she was beautiful or something but nothing could match how he really felt about her so he just sat up on his knees, grabbed her thighs and fucked her.

The sound of their flesh smacking together blended with her moans and his grunts and it just added to his arousal, the build that was quickly running through him. Ben smoothed a hand down to her ass and gripped, pounding into her faster and faster. Her moans turned into whimpers but her eyes stayed on him, desperate and dark and he couldn’t slow down. He groaned her name through gritted teeth and she moaned his in response and that was enough.

He pushed into her in a few slow, full thrusts and then collapsed on top of her. He steadied himself on his forearms next to her head and nuzzled his face in her neck, brushing his lips against her skin. Leslie slid her hands over his sides while his fingers lazily brushed her hair.

Ben fell to her side and wrapped an arm around her waist and hooked his leg with hers. He should probably get up and take the condom off and clean himself up but being away from her sounded agonizing. On each of his inhales he could smell the blend of sex in the air and the vanilla from her hair and it just made him snuggle in closer.

They laid like that, Ben smoothing circles into her stomach and Leslie absently tickling the nape of his neck. He kissed her skin and hummed sporadically and she rubbed her cheek into his hair with a sigh. Leslie turned toward him and kissed him, turning her body into him as the kiss deepened. He spread her lips and slowly swiped his tongue against hers. They separated, Ben rolling on his back with a groan. The warmth from being near her drained out of his skin. He missed her. 

“I have a final.” Ben rubbed his face if only to keep his hands from reaching out for her again.

Leslie was pouting when he turned to her. He laughed and poked her side and she giggled, her body contracting.

He tapped her nose with his finger and stood up, turning around to take off the condom and put it in the trash bin under his desk. 

“Mmm.” 

Ben’s face grew hot. He threw away the condom and turned around. “What?”

“Enjoying the view.”

“Are you talking about my butt?”

She nodded, excited, her smile taking over her face. “Yeah.”

//

The day of the End of Semester Ball felt like a montage that he couldn’t keep his eyes open long enough to watch. 

Leslie pounded on his door at six in the morning, arms full of decorations and to do lists. He squinted at her, annoyed by the light that flooded his room from the hallway. Ben grabbed her wrist, and even though she put up a fight and cursed him for making her drop everything, he did get her to snuggle in his bed for an hour. He mumbled about how much better being in bed was against her neck and she kept shaking her leg, anxious for the start of the day. Ben found that only kissing her pulse point made her leg calm down and her breaths slow. 

They ate Sweetums Pie Tarts for breakfast and ran into Chris, back from his morning run, on their way out. Ben carried half of the things she brought over and as soon as they stepped into the student center, everything began to blur. 

Ben was the numbers guy, a guy with solutions to the budget problems, who could help make better choices to save money. Being this, being Leslie’s right hand man, this was different. It was stressful, calming, inspiring, scary, and amazing all in one. 

As soon as he finished doing one thing, whether it was setting out sodas or talking to maintenance about the raised platform they were building for the makeshift stage, Leslie would have something new for him to do. As hours ticked on, volunteers and friends showed up to offer their help and she somehow kept them occupied as well, rambling off duties and jobs without looking up from her balloon filling and tying station that she stayed at for two hours.

Watching Leslie in this element was breathtaking. She wasn’t stressed, she wasn’t worried, she was excited. Her excitement fueled her, kept her going without a lunch break (“Leslie eat something.” “We had breakfast silly.” “Yeah, five hours ago.”), that made her laugh when Andy dropped a box of streamers, and made her stop to console a freshman girl who was sad she didn’t have a date for the dance. Ben walked up to the two women and Leslie quickly handed him her clip board and took the girl to the bathroom to splash water on her face and Ben walked around, checking off duties from her to-do list until she returned. 

His stomach growled after the sun went down and he noticed volunteers had started leaving to go get ready or find their dates. Ben wanted to take Leslie out to dinner before the dance but he now realized that was an absurd pipe dream as he watched her jump on the stage, making sure it was steady and safe for her performance later. He smiled at her as Andy and April pushed past him, waving and saying they would see him later. Ben nodded, feeling his muscles cramping and weak from the day. He kept his gaze on Leslie.

Her checkered Vans stepped on certain spots of the stage over and over and then jumped to test that particular place. Her face scrunched as she evaluated the surface. Her eyes would look to the ceiling in thought as she bounced on her toes. She took three laps around the square and even sat at Kelly’s drum set and hit the bass drum. Ben smiled and walked over to the stage, jumping onto the platform and tapped the symbol with his finger.

“I think the stage will hold.”

Leslie hit the drum again and he felt the vibration pulse through his legs. 

“I just want everything to be perfect.”

“It will be. It is.” Ben reached across the drums and slid his finger from her ear to the tip of her chin. It was awkward but he had to touch her.

She grinned and stood up, rounding the set. She wrapped her arms around his waist and pushed up on her toes to kiss him. He hummed against her mouth and slipped his hands to her neck.

“Hi, Leslie, I -- oh, sorry.”

Leslie pushed off of Ben and whipped around, her ponytail hitting him on the chin. Ben looked past her. Ben recognized her as one of the volunteers but now she was in her dress, her hair high on her head and very curly and her make up loud. 

“Hi Brandi, you’re early.”

Brandi tilted her head, her blond curls stiff. “No, I’m actually ten minutes late, I was a little busy.” She smiled, huge and pretty. “Where would you like me to set up the ticket table?”

Leslie whipped back around to Ben, her eyes huge. “What time is it?”

Ben shrugged but then remembered he had a watch. “7:10.”

“Oh my God.” Leslie hopped off the stage and ran to the door. “Run, Ben, run!”

Ben tripped off the stage and ran after her.

“Brandi, you are amazing and you will be a great world leader one day. Please just set up wherever you want, I will be back in twenty minutes.” Leslie yelled, pushing through the door.

Ben’s lungs filled with ice as they ran across campus to her dorm room. She fiddled with her keys at the building’s entrance and pushed him away, yelling for him to go get ready. He ran to his own dorm and when he entered he found Chris, pinning a corsage on Ann.

Ben tried to catch his breath so he could ask what was happening, why Ann was here, why the hell everyone was ready for this thing besides him, but instead he just held on to the door knob, breathing in the warm air, defrosting his lungs. 

“Ben Wyatt!” Chris beamed. “I believe you know my beautiful date, Ann Perkins.”

“Hi... Ann.” Ben swallowed, still taking in huge breaths. 

He passed them and dug in his closet for his clothes. He grabbed his shower caddy and a towel and walked back around to the door. He stopped. There was time later to ask how Ann came to know Chris or how Chris knew her well enough to ask her to the ball but Ann deserved to know.

“You look great, Ann.”

Chris’s smile somehow grew bigger and he turned back to his date and kissed her nose as Ann giggled. Ben had never seen her look like that. She usually look guarded around Ben, like she was trying to figure him out and find something in him that she knew she would hate. But with Chris, she just looked like a young woman who was shy and excited to be on a date. Maybe Chris was Ben’s ticket into Ann’s good graces all along.

“Thanks,” she said, her eyes still on Chris.

Ben’s muscles ached but he had no time to let the hot pressure of the shower relax them. He washed his hair and body with the same bottle of soap and didn’t shave, trying to not focus on the stubble along his jaw as he dressed. He had no time to focus on his trembling hands as he tied his red and black striped tie and he didn’t double check to make sure his black and white plaid was tucked into his pants. 

His dorm room was empty when he came back but a note laid on his desk. He read it while he grabbed a pair of socks.

Meet me at the ball. Wear the button. ~ Leslie

Ben unrolled his socks and looked down on the desk. He grabbed the button and smiled, pinning it on the lapel of his blazer that hung over his chair.

He ran around his room, tripping over himself as he put on his socks and shoes and looked in the small mirror that was on his bed. They didn’t have a mirror, this must be Ann’s, left behind. His hair was still a little damp but whatever, he had no time to let it dry and no hair dryer and he really, really wanted to see Leslie.

Ben pulled on his blazer as he pushed out of the building. Students were walking around in various forms of fanciness. Women’s dresses came in puffy and sparkly and in short and tight, and guys were in everything from t-shirts to full suits. He remembered asking Leslie how fancy he would have to dress for the ball and she shrugged.

_“Everyone wears whatever they want. It’s just a celebration, you know, for the students. I’m just here to help give them a place to celebrate, but they are the ones that really make it what it is.”_

Ben pushed past a couple that was buying a ticket, waving at Brandi as he walked in. Tom smacked Ben’s shoulder as he walked by and he found himself waving and nodding at a lot of people as he pushed through the crowd. He put a hand on some one’s shoulder to move past them and when she turned around he was surprised to see Shauna staring back at him.

His stomach dropped, uneasy. She looked him up and down as if she couldn’t believe he was there in front of her either. Then her face shifted, softened, in a small smile and she put her hand up in a tiny wave and he nodded. She turned back to a guy who was wearing a matching tie to her dress and Ben kept walking. He was okay, everything was okay.

April shoved him by pushing his face with her hand to get by, which was unnecessary as there was plenty of room. Ben took in her homemade duct tape dress.

“April, where’s--”

“Talking Swanson’s ear off,” April yelled over the Ace of Base that vibrated the floor. “We go on in five minutes, don’t hold her up, or I will tear out your eye balls and put them in an Alaskan bear.”

“That was horrifically specific.”

April growled at him and walked to the stage. Ben craned his neck for the peek of blonde hair and found it, by the food table, next to the shrimp, which he thought was an odd choice for food at a ball but Leslie insisted. As he walked through the crowd, his throat tightened and his stomach fell slowly to his feet. The music was quieter in this area, mostly just right by the shrimp. He didn’t want to disrupt her, especially considering “Swanson” looked like a professor and this could be important, but God he wanted her to turn around. He could see her dress poking out from underneath her leather jacket. Swanson grabbed another piece of shrimp and plopped it in his mouth and Ben used this pause in conversation to his advantage.

“Leslie.”

She spun around, ready to take on a challenge or task, ready to handle anything. But her face softened when she registered his face and Leslie smiled at him, her nose scrunching. She spun around and Ben wanted to look at her but she hugged him. Her fingers scratched at the nape of his neck and he worried his hair was still wet but she sighed into him. He had only been without her for about a half hour but the way she hugged him and the way he held on to her made it seem like weeks.

“Leslie, you--”

“Ben, this is Professor Swanson.” Leslie turned, sliding her arm behind Ben’s back. Ben put his hand out and Professor Swanson wiped his hand on a napkin before taking Ben’s hand with a firm shake. “This is Ben.” Leslie looked up at Ben and he tried really hard to focus on what she was saying instead of the fierce smell of vanilla and the perfect plump of her red lips. “Professor Swanson is the department head of the Women’s Studies program.”

“Oh,” Ben said. He was surprised to find the department head was a man and Ben wasn’t sure if he was sexist or not. Leslie made him think that a few times a day.

“Yes.” Swanson took another bite of shrimp and it was just then that Ben noticed that no one else was near the shrimp except them. Was the $20 they spent on shrimp just for this guy? “Great shrimp, Leslie.”

“I didn’t want you to go hungry. Please enjoy the dance. I have to go but please let me know if you need anything else.” Leslie smiled and turned, gripping Ben’s waist as she walked. 

“So that’s why we got the shrimp.” Ben smiled, laying his cheek on her head.

“Yeah, I’ve almost gotten Swanson to actually bring up the Women’s Studies issue with the board this semester. Any day now. He just hates paper work. And caring. And me, but that’s okay.”

Ben let her lead him to the stage and she let him go after giving him a quick squeeze. Leslie turned to give him a quick kiss but he stopped her. She tilted her head as he backed up to look at her. His eyes raked her, each sweep of her red plaid dress making his lips turn higher in a sideways smirk. Leslie shifted in her worn Doc Martins and he wanted to touch the skin of her legs but they were covered with dark tights. He also wanted to kiss her shoulders but her leather jacket was in the way. Ben swallowed and took a deep breath.

“Are you objectifying me with your male gaze?” Leslie put her hands on her hips and bit back a smile.

Ben nodded. He reached for her and kissed her. He moaned when they parted, his forehead on hers.

“You’re always objectifying me with your female gaze. Equality, Leslie.”

She captured his lips and smoothed her hand to his ass and squeezed. He jumped with a yelp and they laughed, noses bumping. 

Leslie slid her fingers down the lapel of his blazer and tapped the button she asked him to wear. “You wore it.” Ben looked down at her finger on his lapel, reading the words again upside down: I love my feminist girlfriend.

“You asked me to.”

She flicked her eyes back to his. “Yeah. It’s cute.” She scrunched her nose. “It was also my subtle way of telling you I heard you say you loved me when I woke you up the other night.”

Ben’s face instantly went hot and his stomach tightened. He remembered doing that but he also remembered being half in a dream that involved stacks of waffles and Leslie’s beautiful face, her lips sticky with syrup.

“I--”

“Love your feminist girlfriend? I know.” She tapped the button and kissed his lips quick before spinning and leaving him warm and hollow. 

Ben stood by the stage, his heart pounding his ears. The music faded and every one checked mics and strummed chords and tapped drums and he felt like he was melting into the floor. He stared at Leslie, picking at strings and adjusting the strap of her guitar. She pushed her hair out of her face and he could see the smudge of her red lipstick from their kisses. Then she paused. She looked out into the crowd, that was chatting among themselves, some girls screaming as they said hello. He could hear people opening cans of soda and the click of heels on the floor. Laughter. The flash of cameras. His vision tunneled on her, as her face changed to curiosity into pride and into overwhelming happiness. He got the best version of her, right now, with the perfect lighting, as if this was the part in his movie where he realized everything was perfect. Because it was. 

Because he was in love.

He heard Leslie clear her throat in the mic and she blinked. “I am Leslie Knope.” The crowd cheered. “Thank you so much for coming to the 1995 End of the Semester Ball.” More cheering. “I just want to take a moment to make some brief announcements. First, do not eat the shrimp.” Ben looked back at Ron who nodded appreciatively toward Leslie. “Second, thank you to all who have volunteered their time and money for this event. This wouldn’t be possible without the help of the other clubs on campus and individuals with a lot of heart. Lastly, thank you, most of all, to my awesome, hot boyfriend, Ben Wyatt” - she motioned toward Ben and the crowd turned to him and he felt the sweat building at his forehead - “who shares this project with me.” She smiled at him, taking her mouth away from the mic, only slightly, so that her words were now an amplified whisper. “I love you.”

The crowd irrupted into cheers again. Some people slapped Ben’s back, his shoulders. He just smiled, his eyes locked with hers. She laughed, watching him be congratulated like some kind of star athlete. And then one person pushed him forward, and then another. Two girls grabbed his arm and he was pulled to the front of the stage and pushed again. He stood up on the stage, staggering up. He looked at April, worried his eyes would soon be plucked out, but she was grinning at them.

Leslie was right to pause up there. The view of everything was breathtaking. Everyone was looking at them, anticipating something he didn’t understand. He put his hands behind his back awkwardly. He looked around the room. At Swanson eating shrimp and Jerry petting Li’l Sebastian. At people making out, at the countless eyes staring at him. The decorations, the work, the effort, everything finally together. He turned to Leslie and smiled, shaking his head, trying to tell her he didn’t know why he was up here.

Leslie raked her nails along the line of his jaw and kissed him. The crowd cheered again. 

“We are First Wave!” 

Kelly clicked his drumsticks three times.

Leslie jumped and when she landed, knocked herself into Ben. This song was definitely a Green Day song and Ben figured the sacrifice was made for the crowd. It was a good sacrifice. He watched everyone bounce around as Leslie knocked into him and Andy pushed against his shoulder. April rounded Leslie and nudged Ben toward the edge of the stage. 

Andy started singing and April pushed Ben again. Everyone in front of him put their arms up and it took his brain way too long to connect the dots of what was supposed to happen here. What he was supposed to do.

He looked back at Leslie. She smiled at him, strumming her guitar with ferocity. She shrugged and nodded toward the crowd. His pulse pushed against the skin on his neck and he really wished he didn’t wear a blazer or a tie or this long sleeved shirt. The lights were hot and he was sweating into the fabric of his plaid. April pushed him again and he almost fell over and he watched everyone’s hands shoot into the air, ready.

Ben took a breath and tried to will his heart to slow. He glanced at Leslie, who was bouncing on her toes and walking around the stage. She finally looked at him. Her eyes grew along with her smile. She mouthed “do it” at him and he shook his head. She shook hers back at him and kept strumming. She looked at her hand on the frets of her guitar and then to him. She walked toward him and he could feel the heat from her body, the electricity of her movements, the vibration from the strings. 

“Trust me," she yelled in his ear.

She backed away as she played, keeping her eyes locked on him. He wiped his palms on his pants and looked back to the crowd, to the hands waiting. He bent his knees and even more people scurried toward him and more hands appeared. Ben wanted to look at Leslie again but there was no reason to. She already told him to trust her. And he did.

So he jumped.


End file.
